THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


INTERIOR   OF   THK   SWAN    THEATRK,    at.  1596 
Correct  facsimile  of  the  De  Witt- Van  Buchell  sketch  preserved  at  Utrecht 


THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

A  HISTORY  OF  ENGLISH  NATIONAL  DRAMA 
TO  THE  RETIREMENT  OF  SHAKESPEARE 


BY 

C.  F.  TUCKER  BROOKE,  B.  LITT.  (OxoN.) 

ASSISTANT  PROFESSOR  OF  ENGLISH  IN   Y.M.K  UNIVERSITY 

FOUMKKLY  SENIOR  DEMY  OF  MAODALKN 

COLLEGE,  OXFORD 


BOSTON   NEW   YOKK   CHICAGO 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

•Tbf  fiilicrsibc  press  €ambril>ge 


COPYRIGHT,   1911,  BY  C.   F.  TUCKER  BROOKE 
ALL    RIGHTS   RESERVED 


College 
Library 


657 


PREFACE 

THE  following  pages  have  grown  out  of  a  series  of 
lectures  on  "The  Sources  of  the  Elizabethan  Drama," 
given  in  1908  at  Magdalen  College,  Oxford.  To  the 
members  of  that  society  are  due  the  author's  grateful 
acknowledgments  for  stimulus  and  opportunity.  In 
the  present  volume  very  few  words  remain  as  they  were 
first  written.  The  scope  of  the  book  has  been  consider- 
ably broadened  and  its  commencement  pushed  back 
beyond  the  reign  of  Elizabeth.  It  is  believed,  however, 
that  the  point  of  view  expressed  in  the  title  of  the  lec- 
tures has  been  retained,  and  it  is  hoped  that  the  origi- 
nal aim  of  tracing  the  genesis  and  development  of 
the  various  types  of  Tudor  drama  will  be  found  still 
to  justify  the  method  of  treatment. 

It  is  probably  not  hard  to  defend  the  chronological 
limits  and  the  title  of  this  essay.  There  would  seem  to 
be  a  practical  convenience  in  a  treatment  commencing 
with  the  earliest  evidences  of  English  national  drama 
and  closing  with  the  highest  accomplishment  of  that 
drama  in  the  work  of  Shakespeare.  Nor  does  it  appear 
a  gross  exaggeration  to  include  this  entire  evolution 
within  the  confines  of  "The  Tudor  Drama " ;  for  though 
most  of  the  specimens  discussed  in  the  first  two  chap- 
ters had  their  original  inception  in  the  century  before 
the  Tudor  era  began,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  they 
still  remained  at  the  opening  of  our  period  the  most 
characteristic  expressions  of  English  dramatic  genius, 


iv  PREFACE 

and  that  their  consideration  belongs  justly  therefore 
to  the  history  of  Tudor  culture. 

The  course  of  our  study  brings  the  orbit  of  English 
dramatic  criticism  to  its  perihelion  in  the  examination 
of  Shakespeare,  the  central  sun,  and  those  dramatic 
satellites  who  most  closely  share  his  attitude  toward 
life  and  art.  It  would  be  an  alluring  task  to  trace  this 
orbit  still  farther,  through  the  clearly  connected  Jaco- 
bean, Caroline,  and  Restoration  phases  to  its  aphelion 
at  the  close  of  the  Stuart  epoch.  But  the  consideration 
of  Stuart  drama  in  its  entirety  offers  scope  for  another 
volume,  and  the  temptation  to  stray  beyond  the  logical 
line  of  demarcation  has  here  been  resisted,  except  where 
the  individual  work  of  Shakespeare  forms  for  some  nine 
years  a  kind  of  Tudor  enclave  in  the  midst  of  Jacobean 
literature. 

The  bibliographies  appended  to  the  various  chapters 
have  been  arranged  with  the  idea  of  placing  directly 
before  the  reader's  attention  all  the  essential  literature 
of  the  subjects  under  discussion.  Absolute  technical 
completeness  in  this  matter  seems  beyond  the  range 
of  a  work  which  aspires  to  the  notice  of  the  undergrad- 
uate student  and  the  general  reader.  However,  the 
bibliographies  have  been  independently  compiled;  and, 
except  in  the  case  of  Shakespeare,  no  editions  or  com- 
mentaries have  been  intentionally  omitted  which  appear 
to  possess  any  present-day  importance.  Shakespear- 
ean texts  and  criticisms  are  so  numerous  and  so 
abundantly  catalogued  already,  that  it  has  here  been 
thought  injudicious  to  go  beyond  the  simple  indication 
of  the  important  early  editions  of  each  play.  The  ad- 
mirable and  very  recent  Shakespeare  bibliography  in 
the  fifth  volume  of  the  "Cambridge  History  of  Eng- 


PREFACE  v 

lish  Literature"  leaves  little  to  be  desired,  and  any  re- 
capitulation of  its  results  on  the  smaller  scale  suited  to 
this  book  would  be  a  useless  impertinence. 

To  my  friends,  Professor  W.  L.  Phelps  and  Professor 
H.  N.  MacCracken  of  Yale  University,  I  have  the  plea- 
sure of  expressing  my  most  hearty  thanks  for  various 
helpful  suggestions  and  for  the  careful  reading  of  all 
my  proofs  at  a  period  of  the  academic  year  when  such 
a  service  entailed  a  real  sacrifice  and  became  a  double 
kindness. 

C.  F.  T.  B. 

YALE  UNIVERSITY,  August,  1911. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  I 

SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA 1-46 

English  dramatic  progress  during  the  Tudor  period  (1485- 
1603),  1.  — Sources  of  English  national  drama,  2. —  "The 
Harrowing  of  Hell,"  5.  —  Shrewsbury  Fragments,  ibid.  — 
The  rise  of  the  guild  plays,  6.  —  The  various  guild  cycles,  7.  — 
Manner  of  guild  presentation,  9.  —  Introduction  of  comic 
matter,  14.  —  Developed  clownage  in  the  Wakefield  cycle,  16. 
—  The  "Ludus  Coventrise,"  or  Hegge  plays,  17.  —  Scrip- 
tural dramas  unconnected  with  the  guild  cycles:  "Christ's 
Burial  and  Resurrection,"  20  ;  Dublin  and  Brume  plays  of 
"  Abraham's  Sacrifice,"  21;  "Candlemas  Day,"  23.  —  Miracle 
plays  proper:  "Dux  Moraud,"  27;  the  Croxton  Play  of  the  Sac- 
rament, 29;  "The  Conversion  of  St.  Paul,"  31;  "Mary  Magda- 
lene," 33.  —  General  survey  of  the  religious  drama  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  Tudor  period,  34.  —  The  influence  of  this  drama 
upon  the  Elizabethan  theatre,  35.  —  Bibliography,  38. 

CHAPTER  II 

THE  EARLY  MORALITY 47-68 

The  relation  of  the  morality  to  the  mystery,  47.  —  Pater- 
noster and  creed  plays,  48.  —  The  connection  of  the  morality 
with  profane  allegorical  literature,  49.  —  "The  Pride  of  Life," 
50.  —  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance,"  51.  —  Significance  of  this 
type  of  play  for  the  later  drama,  53.  —  Circumstances  of  presen- 
tation, 55.  —  The  morality  as  an  art  form,  59.  —  "Mind,  Will, 
and  Understanding  "  (or  "  Wisdom  "),  61.  —  "  Mankind,"  63. — 
The  vulgarizing  of  the  morality,  65.  —  Bibliography,  67. 

CHAPTER  III 

THE  TODOR  INTERLUDE 69-102 

Origin  and  nature  of  the  interlude,  69.  —  Medwall's  "  Na- 
ture," 71.  —  "The  Nature  of  the  Four  Elements,"  73.  —  "Wit 


viii  CONTENTS 

and  Science"  and  "Wit  and  Wisdom"  interludes,  76.  —  "The 
World  and  the  Child,"  78.  —  "Hickscorner,"  80.  —  "The  Inter- 
lude of  Youth"  and  "Lusty  Juventus,"  81.  —  Political  inter- 
ludes: Skelton's  "Magnificence,"  82;  minor  satirical  interludes 
and  dialogues,  83;  "  Respublica,"  85.  —  John  Bale,  86.  —  Lind- 
say's "Satire  of  the  Three  Estates,"  88.  —  Interludes  intended 
for  amusement  solely:  John  Hey  wood,  93.  —  Hey  wood  as  dra- 
matic artist,  96.  —  Bibliography,  98. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION 103-146 

Complex  affiliations  of  the  later  interlude,  103.  —  "  John  the 
Evangelist,"  104.  —  Interludes  pointing  an  economic  moral : 
"Wealth  and  Health,"  106;  "Like  Will  to  Like,"  108;  "Impa- 
tient Poverty,"  109 -/'Albion  Knight,"  ibid.;"  The  Trial  of  Trea- 
sure," ibid.  —  The  tendency  to  diffuseness  in  late  interludes,  110. 
—  L.  Wager's  "Repentance  of  Mary  Magdalene,"  112.  —  G. 
Wapull,  "The  Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man,"  113.  —  Metrical  fea- 
tures of  the  latter  play,  115.  —  T.  Lupton,  "AH  for  Money," 
117.  —  W.  Wager,  "The  Longer  Thou  Livest  the  more  Fool 
Thou  Art,"  119.  —  N.  Woodes,  "The  Conflict  of  Conscience," 
120.  —  "The  Contention  between  Liberality  and  Prodigality," 
122.  —  Interludes  based  on  foreign  models:  "NW  Wag*00-" 
124;  T.  Ingelend,  "The  Disobedient  Child,"  125;  G.  Gascoigne, 
"The  Glass  of  Government,"  127.  —  Interludes  introducing 
characters:  John  Bale's  "King  John. 


Hester,"  131;  "King  Darius,"  132;  "Jacob  and  Esau,"  133.  — 
Interludes  based  on  romantic  material :  "  Calisto  and  Melibea," 
133;  John  Phillip's  "Comedy  of  Meek  and  Patient  Grissell," 
135.  —  Interludes  presenting  classic  figures:  "Thersites,"  135; 
J.  Pikering's  "Horestes"  and  related  plays,  138.  —  The  change 
from  interlude  to  Elizabethan  comedy  or  tragedy,  140.  —  Bib- 
liography, 142. 

CHAPTER  V 

CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY 147-187 

The  narrow  range  of  native  English  comedy,  147.  —  Differ- 
ent manifestations  of  Latin  influence  on  Elizabethan  comedy> 
148.  —  Inheritances  from  Latin  drama,  150.  —  Vogue  of  Latin 
comedy  on  the  Continent  and  in  England,  154.  —  Translations 


CONTENTS  i 

of  Terence  and  Plautus,  156.  —  "Jack  Juggler."  156.  —  N. 
Udall,  "Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  158.  —  "Gammer  Gurton's 
Needle,"  161.  —  G.  Gascoigne,  "The  Supposes,"  164. — 
"Misogonus,"  165.  —  "The  Bugbears,"  168.  —  "Fedele  and 
Fortunio,"  169.  —  John  Lyly,  169-179.  His  relation  to  classic 
art  and  to  court  fashion,  170. — Terentian  imitation  in  "  Mother 
Bombie,"  172.  —  Artistic  uncertainty  in  "  Campaspe,"  173. 
—  Lyly's  six  characteristic  plays:  courtly  allegories  and  my- 
thological pastorals,  174.  —  Mythological  pastorals  by  other 
writers:  G.  Peele,  "The  Arraignment  of  Paris,"  180;  "The  Rare 
Triumphs  of  Love  and  Fortune,"  ibid.  —  Bibliography,  181. 


CHAPTER  VI 

CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY 188-229 

Difference  in  the  effect  of  classic  influence  in  comedy  and  in 
tragedy,  188.  —  Seneca  and  his  translators,  189.  —  Borrowings 
from  Seneca,  190.  —  Norton  and  Sackville,  "Ferrex  and  Por- 
rex"  (or  "Gorboduc"),  191. —  Blank  verse  in  this  play,  193.  — 
The  dumb-show,  ibid.  —  T.  Hughes,  etc.,  "The  Misfortunes  of 
Arthur,"  194.  —  Gascoigne  and  Kinwelmersh,  "  Jocasta,"  195. 
—  R.  Wilmot,  etc.,  "Gismond  of  Salerne,"  196.  —  Later  aca- 
demic tragedy  :  Lady  Pembroke  and  her  set,  imitators  of 
Gamier,  198;  Fulke  Greville,  201;  Sir  William  Alexander, 
ibid.  —  The  popularizing  of  the  Latin  tragic  model,  204.  —  Ten- 
tative works  of  the  "Cambises"  type,  205.  —  "Locrine,"  207. — 
Thomas  Kyd,  "The  Spanish  Tragedy,"  209.  —  Characteristics 
anolimnations  ot  Kyd  s  "tragedy  oi  blood,"  2JU. —  "The 
First  Part  of  Jeronimo,"  215.  —  "Soliman  and  Perseda," 
ibid. — Other  successors  of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy  ":  the"Ur- 
Hamlet,"217;  "Titus  Andronicus,  218;  "The  Jew  of  Malta," 
"Lust's  Dominion,"  "Alphonsus  of  Germany,"  219  ;  H. 
Chettle's  "Hoffman,"  220.  —  The  refinement  of  the  type  in 
"Romeo  and  Juliet,"  221.  —  Bibliography,  222. 

CHAPTER  VII 

TUB  HEBOIC  PLAY 230-255 

Remote  origins  of  heroic  drama  in  literature  of  ballad  and 
romance,  230.  —  The  attitude  of  Elizabethan  moralists  and 
scholars  toward  the  species,  233.  —  "Sir  Clyomon  and  Sir 
Clauiidcs,"  23<>.  —  "Common  Conditions,"  237.  —  The  germs 


x  CONTENTS 

of  character  portrayal  in  such  works,  239.  —  Later  efforts  in  the 
same  strain:  T.  Hey  wood's  "Four  Prentices  of  London,"  etc., 
241. — Marlowe's  "Tamburlaine,"  243.  —  Imitations  of  "Tam- 
burlaine  :  It.  (jreene's  "Alphonsus  of  Arxagon,"  "Looking 
Glass  for  London,"  and  "Orlando  Furioso,"  246;  "The  Wars  of 
Cyrus,"  247.  —  Marlowe's  "Doctor  Faustus,"  249.  —  The  dis- 
integration  of  the  heroic  play.  250.  —  Influence  of  the  type  on 
Marlowe's  latest  plays  and  on  Shakespeare,  ibid.  —  Biblio- 
graphy, 252. 

CHAPTER  VIII 

ROMANTIC  COMEDY  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     ....  256-296 

The  influence  of  the  prose  romance  upon  the  drama,  256. 

—  Pastoral   literature   hi  Europe,   258.  —  Longus,  "Daphnis' 
and   Chloe";    Heliodorus,   "^Ethiopica,"  259.  —  Boccaccio's 
"  Ameto,"  260.  —  Montemayor's  "  Diana,"  ibid.  —  Characteris- 
tics of  this  type,  262.  —  The  nature  of  its  influence  on  the 
drama,  263.  —  R.  Greene,  "Friar  Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay," 
265.  —  "James  the  Fourth,"  268.  —  Greene's  method  in  ro- 
mantic comedy  contrasted  with  Shakespeare's,  269. — Romantic 
comedies  possibly    suggested   by  Greene:  "Fair   Em,"  270; 
A.  Munday's  "John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber,"  272,  and 
"Robert  Earl  of  Huntington,"  273;  "The  Merry  Devil  of  Ed- 
monton," 276. —  Shakespeare's  romantic  comedy,  279.  —  Struc- 
tural peculiarities  of  this  type  in  Shakespeare's  presentation, 
281.  —  Slightness  of  responsibility  and  character  development 
among  the  dramatis  personse,  283.  —  Relation  between  Shake- 
speare's romantic  comedies  and  his  more  realistic  dramas,  285. 

—  The  mingling  of  realism  and  romance,  287.  —  Italian  pas- 
toral  drama,    288.  —  Tasso's  "Aminta,"   Guarini's  "Pastor 
Fido,"  289.  —  Imitation  of  this  species  by  S.  Daniel,  291. — 
J.  Fletcher,  "The  Faithful  Shepherdess,"  292.  —  Ben  Jonson, 
"The  Sad  Shepherd,"  ibid.  —  Bibliography,  292. 

CHAPTER  IX 

THE  HISTORY  PLAY        297-351 

De6nition  of  the  species,  297.  —  Causes  of  its  popularity: 
growth  of  nationalism,  298;  demand  for  dramatic  material,  300. 

—  Lost  chronicle  plays  mentioned  by  Henslowe,  301.  —  Influ- 
ence of  "Tamburlaine"  upon  this  type,  302.  —  Five  classes  of 
history  plays  distinguished,  303.  —  "The  Troublesome  Reign 
of  John"  and  Shakespeare's  " King  John,"  304.  —  "The  Fa- 


CONTENTS  i 

mous  Victories  of  Henry  V,"  306.— "The  True  Tragedy  of  Rich- 
ard III."  808.  — "The  Battle  of  Alcazar"  and  "Sclimus,"  311. 
—  Thomas  Lodge,  "The  Wounds  of  Civil  War,"  312.  — The 
Henry  VI  plays,  313.  —  Biographical  history  plays:  "Stukely," 
"Thomas  Lord  Cromwell,"  "Sir  John  OldcasUe,"  "Sir  Thomas 
More,"  321.  —  Marlowe,  "Edward  II,"  822.  —  Shakespeare, 
"Richard  III."  323;  "Richard  II,"  326. —  "The  Tragedy  of 
Woodstock,"  828. —  "Macbeth,"  "Antony  and  Cleopatra," 
and  " Coriolanus,"  329.  —  "Edward  III,"  331.  —  Shakespeare, 
"Henry  IV"  and  "Henry  V,"  832;  "Julius  Csesar,"  336.— 
Plays  on  quasi-historical  subjects  :  Peele's  "  Edward  I,"  etc.. 
838.  — "Look  about  You,"  841.— "The  Blind  Beggar  of 
Bednal-Green,"  etc.,  342.  —  "A  Larum  for  London,"  843.  — 
Thomas  Heywood:  "Edward  IV,"  343;  "If  You  Know  Not 
Me,  You  Know  Nobody."  344.  —  Bibliography,  345. 


CHAPTER  X 

DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT 852-389 

Relation  of  the  contemporary  murder  tragedy  to  the  rude 
chronicle  play,  352.  —  Lost  murder  plays,  853.  —  "  Arden  of 
Feversham,"  355.  —  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women,"  857.  —  R. 
Yarington's  "Two  Tragedies  in  One,"  362.  —  "A  Yorkshire 
Tragedy,"  364.  —  George  Wilkins,  "The  Miseries  of  Enforced 
Marriage":  its  connection  with  the  murder  group  and  with  real- 
istic comedy,  366.  —  T.  Heywood,  "  A  Woman  Killed  with 
Kindness,"  867.  —  Other  indications  of  the  predilection  of 
dramatists  for  dealing  with  the  immediate  present,  369.  —  The 
Marprelate  controversy,  370.  —  Robert  Greene's  allusions, 
371.  —  The  "War  of  the  Theatres,"  372-886.  —  The  probable 
extent  of  Jonson's  connection  with  this  quarrel,  373.  —  "  Every 
Man  out  of  his  Humor,"  375.  "  Cynthia's  Revels,"  ibid .  —  Mar- 
ston's  concern  in  the  dispute,  378.  —  Evidences  of  rivalry  be- 
tween the  Children  of  the  Chapel  and  the  Globe  company, 
380.  —  Allusions  in  "Hamlet,"  381.  — The  second  part  of 
"The  Return  from  Parnassus,"  383.  —  Bibliography,  386. 


CHAPTER  XI 

REALISTIC  COMEDY 390-421 

The  difference  between  Elizabethan  and  Jacobean  realism, 
390.  —  The  Elizabethan  attitude  toward  social  distinctions 


xii  CONTENTS 

391.  —  Characteristic  changes  in  Jacobean  society,  892.  — 
Shakespeare's  realism,  394-401.  —  Jonson  and  Chapman  as 
realists,  402-406.  —  "Every  Man  in  his  Humor,"  406. — 
"Patient  Grissell"  by  Dekker,  Chettle,  and  Haughton,  408.  — 
The  comedy  of  "Timon,"  410.  —  The  Parnassus  group,  411.  — 
"Club  Law,"  412. —  "Wily  Beguiled,"  413.  — "How  a  Man 
May  Choose  a  Good  Wife  from  a  Bad,"  ibid.  —  The  Jacobean 
comedies  of  1603-1608,  414.  —  Bibliography,  416. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA 422-446 

Indoor  and  outdoor  plays,  422.  —  Original  predominance  of 
the  indoor,  aristocratic  species,  423.  —  The  peculiar  status  of 
the  actor  under  Elizabeth  and  its  effect  on  popular  drama,  424. 

—  Player  and  patron,  426.  —  The  evolution  of  public  theatres, 
427.  —  Theatre  and  inn-yard,  428.  —  Elizabethan  staging,  430. 

—  Comparatively  high  mechanical  development  of  the  profes- 
sional stage,  432.  —  The  influence  of  formal  criticism  upon  the 
drama:  Puritan  attacks,  435;  the  struggle  between  classic  and 
romantic  ideals,  436.  —  Elizabethan  drama  as  an  art  product, 
438.  —  Its  connection  with  religion,   439.  —  Causes  of  the 
Jacobean  decline,  442. 

INDEX  ."".    .  447-461 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

INTERIOR  OF  THE  SWAN  THEATRE,  CA.  1596    Frontispiece 

A  GERMAN  SKETCH  OF  THE  Mise  en  Scene  FOR  RELIGIOUS 
PLAYS  ACTED  WITHIN  THE  CHURCH,  FROM  DONAUE- 
BCHINGEN 4 

HUMOROUS  SKETCHES  OF  14ra  CENTURY  PAGEANTS, 
WITH  THEIR  AUDIENCES 10 

SKETCH  ILLUSTRATING  THE  DIVISION  OF  THE  FIXED 
CIRCULAR  STAGE  USED  FOR  THE  CORNISH  Resurrexio 
Domini  Nostri 18 

CONTEMPORARY  SKETCH  (15TH  CENTURY)  GIVING  DI- 
RECTIONS FOR  STAGING  The  Castle  of  Perseverance  .  54 

A   TUDOR   INTERLUDE    (?)    IN    PROGRESS:   LOOKING 

TOWARD  THE   AUDIENCE 140 

TITLE-PAGE  OF  WILLIAM  ALABASTER'S  LATIN  Tragedy 
of  Roxana,  1632,  GIVING  A  PICTURE  OF  AN  ACADEMIC 
STAGE,  WITH  ACTORS  AND  AUDIENCE  ....  192 

YARD  OF  THE  FOUR  SWANS  INN,  BISHOPSGATE,  ILLUS- 
TRATING THE  USUAL  SCENE  OF  POPULAR  DRAMATIC 
PERFORMANCES  BEFORE  1575  .  .  .  .  .  424 

TITLE-PAGE  OF  N.  RICHARDS'S  Tragedy  of  Messattina, 
1640  .  .432 


THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

CHAPTER  I 

SCRIPTURAL  AND   MIRACLE   DRAMA 

WHAT  modern  English  life  and  literature  are  is  due  in  a 
degree  not  easily  overestimated  to  the  three  genera- 
tions of  Tudor  sovereigns.  Far  more  representative 
of  national  temper  than  any  of  their  successors,  much 
more  practical  in  their  assumption  of  the  responsibili- 
ties of  government  than  any  group  of  their  predeces- 
sors, the  Tudors  moulded  popular  feeling  and  created 
a  permanent  national  consciousness.  The  influence  of 
their  age  upon  the  drama  was  particularly  beneficent. 
All  that  is  most  characteristic  in  the  development  of 
the  English  theatre  falls  easily  within  the  one  hundred 
and  eighteen  years  of  their  dominion.  Henry  VII 
found  the  artless  and  provincial  makeshifts  of  guild 
performances  and  the  yet  ruder  devices  of  the  incipient 
morality:  Elizabeth  left  full-grown  a  public  theatre; 
which,  whether  we  measure  its  success  by  actual  artis- 
tic results  or  by  the  sincerity  of  its  reflection  of  con- 
temporary life  and  thought,  finds  few  parallels  and 
probably  no  equal.  The  mystery  cycles  and  "Every- 
man "  represent  the  topmost  reach  of  dramatic  activity 
in  England  when  the  first  Tudor  sovereign  began  his 
reign;  his  grand-daughter  might  ere  she  died  have  seen 
"Hamlet"  and  "Sejanus." 
The  history  of  English  drama  as  a  distinct  national 


2  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

type  begins  with  the  maturity  of  the  guild  cycles,  a 
characteristic  development  of  the  earlier  cosmopolitan 
church  drama,  which  first  appears  in  the  fourteenth 
century,  attaining  its  greatest  popularity  in  the  fif- 
teenth, but  continuing  with  only  gradually  abating 
splendor  till  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth. 

The  origin  of  the  modern  European  theatre  in  the 
services  of  the  mediaeval  church  is  matter  of  common 
knowledge,  and  the  connection  has  perhaps  received 
already  more  explanation  than  it  requires.  We  shall 
see  that  the  relation  between  dramatic  literature  and 
contemporary  religious  feeling  continued  in  England 
till  the  very  end  of  the  Elizabethan  period  one  of  the 
most  vital  influences  in  the  history  of  the  stage.  For 
the  early  Middle  Ages  religion  filled  much  the  place 
that  education  fills  to-day.  The  Church  was  the  gate- 
way to  all  the  learning,  a  full  half  of  the  magnificence, 
and  a  large  part  of  the  romance  of  life.  To  its  direct 
inspiration  we  owe  much  of  the  most  characteristic 
literature  of  medievalism :  the  "Golden  Legend,"  the 
"  Gesta  Romanorum,"  the  "  Cursor  Mundi "  and  "  Prick 
of  Conscience,"  —  no  small  part  even  of  the  work  of 
Gower  and  Chaucer.  But  for  the  drama  the  ecclesi- 
astical influence  was  wider  than  this.  The  pomp  and 
ceremony  of  the  mass,  the  gorgeous  display  of  feast- 
day  processions,  and,  above  all,  the  existence  of  poten- 
tial bands  of  actors  in  the  robed  and  drilled  monks  and 
choristers,  combined  to  make  the  Roman  Church  an 
inevitable  nursery  of  the  histrionic  art. 

During  the  ninth  and  tenth  centuries  the  germs  of 
modern  drama  appeared  in  the  elaborate  ritual  of  the 
Easter  service  in  the  greater  cathedrals  and  monas- 
teries of  Europe.  The  dramatic  liturgies  thus  evolved 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA         3 

consisted  originally  of  a  few  lines  of  question  and 
answer  chanted  responsively  by  priests,  and  taken 
almost  literally  from  the  Vulgate  Latin  lesson  for  the 
day.  The  following  four  lines  of  dialogue  from  a  ninth- 
century  manuscript  of  the  Swiss  monastery  of  St.  Gall 
comprise  the  simplest  version  extant  of  the  so-called 
Easter  " trope ":- 

"Quern  quaeritis  in  sepulchre,  Christicolae  ?" 
"  lesum  Nazarenum  crucifixum,  o  caelicolae." 
"Non  est  hie,  surrexit  sicut  praedixerat. 
Ite,  nuntiate  quia  surrexit  de  sepulchro." 

A  century  later  the  "  Concordia  Regularis  "  of  St.  Eth- 
anwold  (ca.  980)  furnishes  the  first  document  dealing 
with  the  drama  on  English  soil,  in  a  set  of  directions  for 
the  acting  of  a  Winchester  trope  differing  only  in 
the  slightest  details  from  that  of  St.  Gall. 

In  imitation  of  these  Easter  celebrations,  bits  of 
choral  dialogue,  likewise  beginning  with  the  words 
"Quern  quaeritis,"  were  early  devised  for  insertion  into 
the  services  of  Christmas  and  Ascension  Day.  Once 
introduced,  the  dramatic  element  in  the  liturgy  be- 
came widely  popular  and  rapidly  extended  itself. 
Harking  back  from  the  Christmas  play  of  the  Saviour's 
birth,  characters  and  events  from  the  Old  Testament 
were  introduced  by  way  of  prologue  or  forecast,  while 
at  the  same  time  the  Easter  and  Ascension  plays  de- 
veloped sequels  dealing  with  the  reign  of  Antichrist 
and  the  Final  Judgment.  It  was  but  the  matter  of  a 
century  or  so  till  the  two  sets  of  plays,  presenting  re- 
spectively the  birth  of  Christ  and  his  resurrection  and 
ascension,  had  grown  to  meet  each  other  and  fused 
into  a  complete  religious  drama  embracing  the  history 
of  the  Bible  from  Creation  to  Judgment  Day. 


4  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Into  the  nature  of  the  drama  which  was  thus  forming 
itself  during  the  middle  centuries  of  the  dark  ages 
within  the  bosom  of  the  Church,  there  entered  several 
alien  elements,  later  productive  of  scandal,  suppression, 
persecution,  and  finally  the  complete  self-assertion  and 
independence  of  the  stage.  The  licensed  burlesques  of 
religion,  incident  to  jocular  monastic  festivals  like  the 
Feast  of  the  Ass  and  the  Boy  Bishop,  were  the  means  of 
introducing  into  the  serious  drama  the  element  of  comic 
irreverence  which  persists  in  the  Elizabethan  Lords  of 
Misrule,1  and  which,  long  before  the  time  of  Elizabeth, 
had  annihilated  all  just  claim  of  the  theatre  to  reli- 
gious influence  or  ecclesiastical  sanction. 

From  primeval  pagan  customs  like  the  village  dance 
the  nascent  drama  derived  important  characteristics, 
only  thinly  disguised  under  the  religious  exterior  of  the 
whole,  —  characteristics  which  survive  most  plainly 
in  the  Morris  dances  and  St.  George  plays  of  later 
times.2 

A  third  source  of  extra-ecclesiastical  influence  ex- 
isted in  the  mimetic  performances  of  the  buffoons  and 
story-tellers  —  mimes  and  jongleurs  —  who  wandered 
everywhere  through  mediaeval  Europe,  ministering  to 
the  popular  thirst  for  that  histrionic  imitation  of  life 
which  the  serious  church  drama  gave,  and  yet  gave 
insufficiently.  For  these  mimes  it  is  possible  to  make 
out  a  continuous,  though  partly  supposititious,  pedi- 
gree, straight  from  the  late  Latin  mountebanks  to  the 
clowns  of  the  Elizabethan  stage,  —  the  only  piece  of 

1  For  an  unsympathetic,  Puritan,  account  of  the  Lords  of  Misrule, 
see  Stubbes,  Anatomic  of  Abuses  (1583),  ed.  1879, 146-148. 

1  See  A.  B.  Beatty,  The  St.  George  or  Mummers'  Plays ;  a  Study  in 
the  Protology  of  the  Drama,  1906. 


KEY  TO   NO.  1. 

A,  B,  C.  The  three  di- 
visions of  the  stage, 
corresponding;  to 
the  nave,  choir, 
and  sanctuary  of  a 
church. 

1.  The  first  door. 

2.  lk-11. 

3.  The     Garden     of 
Gethsemane. 

4.  Mount  Olivet. 

5.  The  second  door. 
C.  Herod's  palace. 

7.  Pilate's  palace. 

8.  The      pillar       of 
scourging. 

9.  The  pillar  for  the 
cock. 

10.  The  house  of  Cai- 
aphas. 

11.  The  house  of  An- 
nas. 

12.  The  house  of  the 
Last  Supper. 

13.  The  third  door. 

14.  !.->,  Ifi,  17.  Graves 
from    which    the 
dead  arise. 

15.  19.    Crosses  of  the 

two  thieves. 

20.  Cross  of  Christ. 

21.  The    Holy  Sepul- 
chre. 

22.  Heaven. 


A  GERMAN  SKETCH  OF  THE  MISB  EV  SC&XE  FOR  RELIGIOUS  PLAYS 
ACTED  WITHIN   THE   CHURCH,  FROM  DONAUE8CHINGEN 


Reproduced  from  E.  K.  Chambers,  Mtditeval  Stage. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA         5 

even  tolerably  probable  classic  influence  which  the 
English  drama  can  be  shown  to  feel  for  many  a  day. 

The  history  of  dramatic  origins  is  an  international 
affair.  Evidence  has  to  be  pieced  together  over  the 
face  of  all  Europe,  and  one  of  the  most  striking  facts 
evolved  is  the  original  absence  of  local  or  personal 
peculiarities.  For  England,  indeed,  till  the  beginning 
of  the  fourteenth  century,  the  dramatic  records  are  so 
scanty  as  to  reveal  almost  nothing,  except  a  general  and 
rather  backward  adherence  to  the  scheme  of  develop- 
ment, illustrated  by  the  liturgical  plays  of  France  and 
Germany.  The  earliest  drama  was  written  entirely  in 
Latin,  and  without  suggestion  of  any  special  local  con- 
sciousness. Only  in  the  more  advanced  and  less  ortho- 
dox plays  can  we  trace  the  gradual  intrusion  of  the  ver- 
nacular spirit  and  idiom. 

It  is  usual  to  count  among  the  very  earliest  attempts 
at  dramatic  writing  in  English  "The  Harrowing  of 
Hell,"  preserved  in  three  manuscripts  of  the  beginning 
of  the  fourteenth  century.  This  piece  of  two  hundred 
and  forty-four  lines  consists  mainly  of  speeches,  in  short 
riming  couplets,  by  Dominus  (i.  e.,  Christ),  Satan,  the 
"Janitor"  of  Hell,  and  the  departed  spirits  of  Adam, 
Eve,  Abraham,  David,  John  the  Baptist,  and  Moses. 
It  seems  perfectly  clear,  however,  that  the  work  was 
never  intended  for  actual  presentation,  and  it  remains 
doubtful  whether  its  author  can  properly  be  consid- 
ered to  have  crossed  the  wide  gulf  which  separates  the 
true  drama  from  the  universal  mediaeval  device  of 
rhetorical,  homiletic  dialogue. 

Much  more  real  importance  attaches  to  three  dra- 
matic fragments  discovered  at  Shrewsbury  in  1890. 
Each  of  these  pieces  gives  the  speeches  of  a  single  actor 


6  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

in  a  play,  partly  English  and  partly  Latin,  dealing  re- 
spectively with  the  Adoration  of  the  Shepherds,  the 
Resurrection,  and  the  Journey  to  Emmaus.  Though 
the  manuscript  which  contains  them  has  been  referred 
to  no  earlier  date  than  the  commencement  of  the  fif- 
teenth century,  these  three  broken  survivals  seem  the 
best  existing  illustration  of  theatrical  conditions  in 
England,  during  the  long  dark  period  of  transition 
from  the  Latin  dramatized  liturgy  to  the  play  of  native 
speech  and  character.1 

Genuinely  national  drama  shows  itself  first  in  Eng- 
land, in  the  fourteenth  century,  and  it  owes  its  exist- 
ence in  the  form  in  which  we  find  it  to  two  apparently 
quite  irrelevant  circumstances.  The  first  is  the  estab- 
lishment by  Pope  Clement  V,  in  1311,  of  the  Thursday 
after  Trinity  Sunday  as  the  feast  of  Corpus  Christi,2  in 
recognition  of  the  theory  of  transubstantiation.  This 
festival,  occurring  in  early  summer,  two  months  after 
Easter  and  ten  days  after  Whitsunday, was  everywhere 
a  day  of  popular  celebration,  and  it  became  in  England 
the  period  par  excellence  for  dramatic  performances. 
Nearly  all  the  cyclical  mystery  plays  were  destined  for 
presentation  either  on  Corpus  Christi  Day  itself,  or 
during  the  previous  week  of  Whitsuntide. 

The  second  alien  influence  which  shaped  early  Eng- 
lish dramatic  convention  was  the  rise  of  the  trade 
guilds.  During  the  whole  career  of  the  mystery  play, 
these  self-governing  corporations  of  Bakers,  Barkers, 
Butchers,  and  so  forth,  largely  dominated  the  civic  poli- 

1  For  an  admirable  study  of  liturgical  dramatic  origins,  see  F.  W. 
Cady,  "The  Liturgical  Basis  of  the  Towneley   Mysteries,"  PubL 
Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.,  1909. 

2  Ineffectively  promulgated  by  Urban  IV  ;n  1264. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA          7 

cies  of  all  the  important  towns.  At  the  earliest  period 
from  which  it  is  possible  to  trace  the  consecutive  history 
of  English  drama  —  that  is,  in  the  first  half  of  the 
fourteenth  century  —  we  find  that  the  production  and 
performance  of  plays  had  already  passed,  for  the  most 
part,  out  of  the  hands  of  the  clergy  and  into  those  of  the 
guilds.  Parish  plays  did  still  exist,  particularly  in  the 
smaller  villages,  where  presumably  the  guild  system 
had  been  relatively  little  developed,1  and,  for  special 
reasons,  in  the  city  of  London.  There  are,  too,  indi- 
cations of  the  acting  of  mystery  plays  by  strolling 
companies  of  professionals,  such  as  commonly  pre- 
sented moralities.  But  those  features  of  the  mystery 
play,  which  have  most  significance  for  the  evolution  of 
the  later  drama,  are  particularly  the  outgrowth  of  the 
artistic  method  and  the  treatment  of  life  inaugurated 
and  maintained  in  the  guild  performances. 

There  are  still  extant,  either  in  full  or  fragmentary, 
mystery  plays  acted  during  the  fourteenth,  fifteenth, 
and  sixteenth  centuries  by  the  trade  guilds  of  Chester, 
York,  Wakefield,  Coventry,  Norwich,  and  Newcastle. 
These  remains  make  up  in  volume,  as  well  as  in  histori- 
cal significance  and  inherent  merit,  by  far  the  most 
important  existing  portion  of  the  English  Scriptural 
drama.  Guild  plays  of  similar  nature,  well  authenti- 
cated by  records,  but  unfortunately  not  known  to  sur- 
vive, were  acted  at  Beverley  (Yorkshire),  Aberdeen, 
Canterbury,  Lincoln,  Hereford,  and  in  many  other 
places.  As  regards  the  Wakefield  cycle,  preserved  in 

1  See  the  interesting  notes  of  expenditures  for  dramatic  per- 
formances preserved  in  the  Church-wardens'  Accounts  of  Yarmouth 
and  Bungay  between  1462  and  1591,  quoted  by  L.  T.  Bolingbroke, 
Norfolk  Archaeology,  xi  (1892),  334-338. 


8  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  famous  Towneley  manuscript,  few  details  con- 
cerning the  manner  or  date  of  performance  are  at 
hand.  All  the  others  named  above  were  presented 
on  Corpus  Christi  Day,  with  the  exception  of  those 
of  Chester,  Norwich,  and  probably  Lincoln,  where  the 
production  seems  to  have  been  pushed  forward  into 
the  preceding  week  of  Whitsuntide,  or  else  deferred,  as 
at  Lincoln,  till  St.  Anne's  Day  (July  26). 

Of  English  mystery  plays  the  Chester  cycle  appears 
to  be  the  oldest  in  date  of  composition,  as  it  is  certainly 
the  youngest  in  the  matter  of  manuscript  authority. 
There  is  very  respectable  evidence  for  the  belief  that 
the  Chester  performances  began  as  early  as  1328,  and 
that  the  text  presented  in  that  year  was  prepared  by 
no  less  a  writer  than  the  famous  Ranulph  Higden, 
author  of  "  Polychronicon."  l  If  this  theory  is  correct, 
Higden  must  stand  forth  as  both  the  first  and  the  last 
literary  personality,  who  can  be  at  all  reasonably  cred- 
ited with  the  composition  of  English  mysteries.  The 
Chester  plays  are  extant  in  five  manuscripts,  dating 
from  the  period  1591-1607.  The  two  other  sets  of 
guild  plays  which  survive  in  fairly  complete  form, 
those  of  York  and  Wakefield  respectively,  are  each 
preserved  in  a  single  mid-fifteenth-century  text.  The 
composition  of  the  York  cycle  has  been  referred  to 
about  1350,  while  that  of  the  Wakefield  group,  which 
in  originality  and  literary  value  marks  the  highest 
reach  of  English  dramatic  writing  in  this  kind,  is 
ascribed  with  much  probability  to  the  opening  decades 
of  the  fifteenth  century. 

1  In  defence  of  Higden's  authorship,  see  E.  K.  Chambers,  Mediae- 
val Stage,  ii,  348  ff  and,  in  particular,  S.  B.  Hemingway,  English 
Nativity  Plays,  1909,  xix  ff. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA          9 

Of  the  ten  plays  which  originally  made  up  the  genu- 
ine Coventry  cycle,  only  two  exist,  transmitted  in  six- 
teenth-century versions:  the  one,  acted  by  the  Shear- 
men and  Tailors,  dealing  with  the  Birth  of  Christ  and 
the  Slaughter  of  the  Innocents;  the  other,  that  of  the 
Weavers,  presenting  Christ  before  the  Doctors  in  the 
Temple.  From  the  Norwich  cycle,  as  from  that  of 
Newcastle,  we  possess  only  a  single  play.  The  records 
of  the  Grocers'  Company  of  the  former  city  preserve 
two  versions,  dated  1533  and  1565  respectively,  of  the 
drama  acted  by  that  guild,  the  subject  being  the  fall 
of  man  and  expulsion  from  Paradise;1  while  from  the 
Newcastle  sequence  there  remains  the  play  of  the  build- 
ing of  the  ark,  assigned,  with  the  rather  fantastic  ap- 
propriateness usual  in  the  distribution  of  subjects,  to 
the  guild  of  the  Shipwrights. 

The  guild  performances  introduced  many  very  im- 
portant innovations  in  the  staging  of  religious  drama. 
The  species  had  originated  in  the  Church,  and  while 
performed  by  the  clergy,  seems  nearly  always  to  have 
been  presented,  either  in  the  sanctuary  itself,  or  on  the 
holy  ground  adjoining.  We  know  little  or  nothing  of 
the  causes  and  manner  of  transference  from  Church  to 
guild,  except  that  it  was  gradual.  Church  performances 
certainly  existed  in  many  places  by  the  side  of  guild 
performances,  and  the  ecclesiastical  authorities  of 
several  towns  enjoyed  a  practical,  as  well  as  a  theoreti- 
cal control,  over  the  lay  actors.  The  result  of  the 
change,  however  accomplished,  was  a  great  increase 

1  These  texts  were  first  printed,  with  valuable  extracts  from  the 
guild  book  by  R.  Fitch.  Norfolk  Archaeology,  v  (1859).  A  list  of  the 
twelve  Norwich  pageants,  of  which  the  Grocers'  alone  survives,  ia 
given  by  H.  Harrod,  Norfolk  Archaeology,  iii  (1852),  3-18. 


10  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

both  in  the  number  of  players  and  in  the  number  of 
spectators;  and  at  the  same  time,  probably,  the  loss  of 
the  old  place  of  presentation,  which,  even  if  retained, 
could  hardly  have  sufficed  for  the  increased  demands. 
It  was  a  matter  no  longer  of  a  religious  exercise  by 
parish  clergy,  before  a  congregation  of  the  righteous, 
but  rather  of  a  spectacle  offering  scope  in  the  produc- 
tion for  the  rivalry  of  all  the  city  crafts,  and  having  as 
a  public  the  whole  motley  and  congested  population  of 
a  mediaeval  town  on  fair  day. 

The  usual  solution  of  the  difficulty  was  the  develop- 
ment of  the  individual  pageant  and  the  processional 
style  of  acting.  The  "pageant"  was,  in  its  simplest 
form,  a  stage  on  wheels,  provided  and  decorated  by 
one  of  the  town  guilds  for  the  exhibition  of  the  particu- 
lar portion  of  the  Scripture  story  assigned  to  that  guild. 
Ordinarily,  there  were  two  floors:  the  upper,  an  open 
platform  where  the  play  was  acted;  the  lower,  an 
enclosed  dressing-room  for  the  actors.  The  various 
pageants  naturally  differed  in  appearance,  according  to 
the  taste  and  wealth  of  the  guild  which  furnished 
them,  and  also  according  to  the  nature  of  the  scene  to 
be  staged  upon  them.  So  the  pageant  of  the  craft  of 
fishermen,  presenting  Noah  and  the  flood,  would  be 
formed  into  a  rough  similitude  of  the  Ark,  while  those 
used  for  scenes  where  devils  were  to  appear  would  have 
the  passage  between  dressing-room  and  stage  adorned 
with  the  conventional  representation  of  "hell-mouth." l 
Altogether,  in  general  shape  and  use,  and  in  the  ar- 
rangements for  their  building  and  up-keep,  the  guild 

1  The  third  (Glaziers')  pageant  in  the  Norwich  procession  was 
entitled  "Hell  Cart,"  and  payments  were  made  by  this  guild  "for 
keeping  of  fire  at  Hell  Mo[u]the."  Cf.  Norfolk  Archaeology,  iii,  12. 


HUMOROUS    SKETCHES    OF    14™!    CENTURY    PAGKAXTS,    WITH    THEIR    AUDIENCES 

I  Unit  rat  inna  from  a  French  MS.  (Bodley  204),  probably  compiled  on  English  soil 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        11 

pageants  manifest  some  analogy  to  the  rows  of  barges 
maintained  on  Isis  or  Cam,  by  the  different  colleges  of 
Oxford  and  Cambridge.  If  we  remember  the  former  to 
be  vehicles  on  wheels  rather  than  boats,  and  conceive 
them  small  enough  to  be  drawn  by  eight  or  ten  guild 
members  through  narrow  mediaeval  streets,  there  will 
probably  be  even  a  certain  similarity  of  appearance. 

In  the  palmy  days  of  the  mystery  play  —  through 
the  fifteenth  century  and  the  first  half  of  the  sixteenth 
—  every  guild  was  required  to  support  a  pageant, 
either  independently  or,  in  the  case  of  the  less  pros- 
perous bodies,  in  connection  with  others;  and  every 
craftsman  was  taxed  annually  for  "pageant  pence." 
On  the  other  hand,  those  members  who  acted  parts  in 
the  plays,  as  well  as  those  detailed  to  draw  the  pageant, 
received  fees  in  proportion  to  their  services.  Dilatory  or 
careless  guilds,  and  actors  who  failed  to  learn  their 
parts,  were  fined.  The  average  cost  per  capita  to  the 
guild  members  of  a  play-acting  city  may  have  been 
from  twopence  to  eightpence  a  year,  —  no  very  incon- 
siderable sum  in  1450.  Certainly  there  was  incessant 
grumbling  over  what  was  increasingly  felt  to  be  an 
exaction,  and  constant  appeals  were  made  to  the  cor- 
poration for  relief  or  redistribution  of  the  burden. 
The  end  of  the  Norwich  Grocers'  Pageant,  about  1570, 
is  probably  representative  of  the  ultimate  fate  of  all. 
This  structure,  described  as  "a  Howse  of  Waynskott, 
paynted  and  buylded  on  a  Carte,  with  foure  whelys," 
and  adorned  with  a  gilt  griffin,  was  on  the  discontinu- 
ance of  the  annual  performances  stored  with  one  John 
Sotherton  in  London,  till,  the  charges  having  reached 
the  sum  of  twenty  shillings,  and  the  vehicle  having  be- 
come rotten  and  unsalable,  Sotherton's  heir,  Nicholas, 


12  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

was  authorized  to  reimburse  himself  by  knocking  it  to 
pieces. l 

In  some  towns  a  single  performance  of  the  cycle  in  a 
public  place  was  regarded  as  sufficient.  Such  seems  to 
have  been  the  practice  at  Canterbury  and  Norwich. 
But  more  generally,  as  at  Chester,  York,  Beverley, 
Newcastle,  and  Coventry,  it  was  found  necessary,  in 
order  to  reach  all  the  multitudinous  spectators,  to  re- 
peat the  performances  at  each  of  a  number  of  stations, 
in  different  parts  of  the  city.  The  pageants  moved  in 
procession  from  one  appointed  stopping  place  to  the 
next,  and  found  an  audience  gathered  at  each.  Thus, 
the  pageant  of  the  guild  first  in  order,  presenting 
normally  the  fall  of  Lucifer  and  the  creation  of  man, 
would  give  its  play  at  station  one,  and  then  move  to 
station  two  for  a  second  performance,  while  the 
pageant  next  in  order  would  be  acting  before  the  spec- 
tators at  the  first  station  the  next  scene  in  the  Bible 
story  —  say,  the  killing  of  Abel.  The  locus  classicus  con- 
cerning the  appearance  and  use  of  the  guild  pageants 
is  found  in  the  words  of  Archdeacon  Rogers  of  Chester 
(d.  1595),  preserved  in  two  British  Museum  manu- 
scripts (Harley  1948  and  1944),  and  first  quoted  in 
Thomas  Sharp's  "  Dissertation  on  the  Coventry  Mys- 
teries "  in  1825.  Rogers  defines  the  pageant  as  "a  high 
scaffold  with  two  rooms,  a  higher  and  a  lower,  upon 
four  wheels.  In  the  lower  they  apparelled  themselves, 
and  in  the  higher  room  they  played,  being  all  open  on 
the  top,  that  all  beholders  might  hear  and  see  them. 
The  places  where  they  played  them  was  in  every  street. 
They  began  first  at  the  Abbey  gates  [i.  e.,  in  Chester 
performances]  and  when  the  first  pageant  was  played, 
1  Cf.  Norfolk  Archaeology,  v  (1859),  31. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       13 

it  was  wheeled  to  the  high  cross  before  the  Mayor,  and 
so  to  every  street,  and  so  every  street  had  a  pageant 
playing  before  them  at  one  time,  till  all  the  pageants 
for  the  day  appointed  were  played,  and  when  one 
pageant  was  near  ended,  word  was  brought  from  street 
to  street,  that  so  they  might  come  in  place  thereof, 
exceeding  orderly,  and  all  the  streets  have  their 
pageants  afore  them  all  at  one  time  playing  together; 
to  see  which  plays  was  great  resort,  and  also  scaffolds 
and  stages  made  in  the  streets  in  those  places  where 
they  determined  to  play  their  pageants." 

The  guild  plays  deserve  the  especial  attention  of  the 
student  of  the  drama,  because  in  the  matter  of  stage 
practice,  and  in  the  development  of  certain  comic  ideals 
and  types,  their  influence  upon  later  dramaturgy  is 
paramount.  The  rivalry  between  the  different  crafts 
in  the  decoration  and  costuming  of  their  respective 
pageants  produced,  naturally,  a  lavishness  of  expendi- 
ture and  a  taste  for  gorgeous,  if  anachronistic,  stage 
finery,  quite  beyond  the  imaginings  of  the  simple 
church  performers  or  the  itinerant  actors  of  moralities. 
When  the  Elizabethan  drama  sprang  new  into  existence, 
during  the  last  quarter  of  the  sixteenth  century,  it 
took  over,  with  little  change  or  conscious  development, 
the  properties,  the  scenic  effects,  and  much  of  the  stage 
business  which  the  guild  actors  had  evolved.  The  rela- 
tion on  the  purely  literary  side  is  much  more  remote, 
but  in  respect  of  the  externals  of  stage  management, 
there  is  no  doubt  that  the  drama  of  Elizabeth  is  influ- 
enced throughout  its  career  by  the  popular  taste  and 
aesthetic  standards,  developed  during  the  two  preced- 
ing centuries  by  the  most  elaborate  dramatic  enter- 
tainments of  that  period,  —  those  presented  by  the 


14  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

guilds  at  Corpus  Christi.  Extensive  records  of  the  ex- 
penditure for  mise  en  scene  are  extant  in  the  guild 
books  of  Coventry,  Chester,  Beverley,  Norwich,  and 
elsewhere;  and  these  form  a  most  illuminating  coun- 
terpart to  the  similar  entries  in  the  famous  diary  of 
Shakespeare's  contemporary  and  rival  stage-manager, 
Philip  Henslowe. 

The  same  emulation  between  the  guilds,  which  im- 
pelled each  to  vie  with  the  rest  in  the  gorgeousness  of 
its  pageant  and  the  splendor  of  its  costumes,  led  them 
also  to  bid  for  popularity  in  another  manner  significant 
for  the  history  of  the  later  drama.  The  Scriptural 
plays,  while  acted  within  the  church,  can  hardly  have 
contained  many  avowedly  humorous  touches,  though 
certain  germs  of  comedy  may  be  detected,  as  we  have 
seen,  from  almost  the  very  start.  In  the  hands  of  the 
guilds,  however,  the  plays  were  relieved  from  imme- 
diate ecclesiastical  supervision,  and  the  temptation 
was  strong  for  each  craft  to  make  the  most  of  the  dra- 
matic possibilities  of  the  scene  allotted  to  it.  In  most 
cases,  buffoonery  was  felt  to  possess  a  surer  hold  on  the 
attention  of  the  spectators  than  pathos,  and  every 
comic  hint  was  eagerly  improved.  With  the  main 
figures  in  the  Bible  narrative,  few  such  liberties  could 
be  taken.  Cain,  Noah,  Joseph,  Pilate,  and  Herod 
offered  most  scope  for  humorous  treatment.  But  the 
greatest  opportunity  for  the  comic  writer  lay  in  the  de- 
velopment of  minor  characters,  to  which  the  Scripture 
ascribes  no  distinct  personality ;  and  here  we  find  aris- 
ing and  maturing,  among  the  artless  crudities  of  dra- 
matized religion,  a  comedy  of  real  life,  which  not  only 
kept  the  guild  plays  alive,  in  the  face  of  violent  muni- 
cipal and  ecclesiastical  hostility,  long  after  they  had 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        15 

lost  every  other  hold  on  their  public,  but  which  passed 
easily  and  with  unimpaired  vitality  into  the  later 
drama.  The  "garcio"  or  servant  of  Cain,  the  wife  of 
Noah,  Pharaoh  king  of  Egypt,  Augustus  Caesar,  the 
shepherds  of  the  nativity,  the  torturers  of  the  cruci- 
fixion, Lucifer,  Antichrist,  and  the  demons  of  the  final 
judgment,  are  all  figures  concerning  whose  character 
the  Bible  has  nothing,  or  very  little,  to  say.  Here, 
then,  the  fledgling  drama  might  try  its  wings,  unre- 
strained by  respect  for  authority  or  fear  of  hetero- 
doxy. 

In  the  insertion  and  treatment  of  comic  incident  we 
find  the  most  significant  differences  between  the  vari- 
ous extant  cycles,  and  here  we  can  perceive  the  first 
hints  of  the  all-important  change  from  the  workings  of 
impersonal,  popular  tendencies  to  the  conscious  art 
of  an  easily  recognizable,  though  nameless,  dramatic 
genius.  Of  the  extant  cycles,  that  of  York  contains  the 
least  comedy,  not  so  much  probably  because  the  text 
of  these  plays  seems  to  be  a  little  earlier  than  that  of  the 
rest,  as  because  the  clerical  censorship  of  the  guild  per- 
formances is  known  to  have  been  considerably  more 
strict  in  the  archiepiscopal  city  than  elsewhere.  The 
Chester  plays,  as  we  have  them,  represent  an  advance 
in  freedom  upon  those  of  York,  and  contain  a  few 
scenes  of  good  fooling,  but  they  bear  little  relation  to 
the  other  cycles,  and  have  been  regarded  by  some 
critics  as  an  imitation  from  French  sources.1  The 
Coventry  Shearmen-Tailors'  play  of  the  Slaughter  of 
the  Innocents  introduces  a  Herod  of  well-developed 
comic  proportions,  who,  as  a  stage  direction  informs  us, 

1  See,  in  opposition  to  this  theory,   S.  B.  Hemingway,  op.  cii. 
zxiv  ff. 


16  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"ragis  in  the  pagond  and  in  the  strete  also,"  and  who 
seems  half  independent  of  the  serious  story.  Equally 
advanced  is  the  humor  of  the  Newcastle  Shipwrights' 
play,  where  the  devil  enters,  with  his  customary  shout 
of  "Out,  out,  harro,  and  welaway,"  to  work  mischief  in 
Noah's  household  by  arousing  the  suspicion  and  per- 
versity of  the  patriarch's  shrewish  wife. 

Rustic  clownage  comes  finally  into  its  own  in  the 
Wakefield  or  "Towneley  "  cycle,  where  the  serious  nar- 
rative is  often  little  more  than  a  peg  upon  which 
to  hang  farcical  sketches  of  braggarts  like  Pharaoh, 
Herod,  and  Augustus;  or  satire  on  contemporary  po- 
litical and  social  conditions,  as  in  the  Judgment  Day 
scene  between  Tutivillus  and  his  companion  demons; 
or  else  realistic  studies  in  north-country  peasant  life, 
such  as  the  garcio  of  Cain,  Noah's  obdurate  wife,  or  the 
numerous  shepherd  types.  It  is  in  this  last  genre,  so 
characteristic  of  his  district,  that  the  Wakefield  master- 
dramatist  has  secured  his  greatest  triumphs.  Pike- 
harnes,  the  garcio,  or  ploughboy,  is  a  good  yokel  type, 
free  of  tongue  and  fist;  but  the  shepherds  are  pictured 
with  even  greater  sympathy  and  local  color.  Two 
separate,  alternative  versions  of  the  shepherd  scene 
exist,  totalling  more  than  twelve  hundred  lines.  In 
both  sketches  the  gospel  matter  is  ignored  through 
at  least  three  quarters  of  the  play  by  reason  of  the 
author's  interest  in  the  character  and  conversation  of 
his  well-individualized  shepherds.  The  second  play, 
the  celebrated  "Secunda  [Pagina]  Pastorum,"  carries 
us  indeed  well  out  of  the  province  of  Scriptural  drama, 
and  into  that  of  pure  comedy,  presenting  English  liter- 
ature in  the  episode  of  Mak,  the  sheep-stealer,  with  a 
native  farce,  which  is  not  only  the  first  extant  example 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       17 

of  this  species,  but  which,  in  the  handling  of  suspense 
and  climax,  is  unequalled  by  any  work  of  the  next  cen- 
tury and  a  half. 

In  connection  with  the  guild  plays  just  discussed,  it  is 
necessary  to  consider  the  so-called  "Ludus  Coventrise," 
generally  counted  as  adding  a  fourth  great  mystery 
cycle  to  those  of  Chester,  York,  and  Wakefield.  In  a 
number  of  important  particulars,  however,  the  '*  Ludus 
Coventrise"  stands  alone,  and  in  the  present  doubtful 
state  of  our  knowledge  concerning  it,  tends  rather  to 
obscure  than  to  clear  up  the  dramatic  history  of  the 
time.  There  is  no  satisfactory  ground  for  connecting 
this  series  of  plays  with  the  town  of  Coventry,  where 
we  know  the  guilds  to  have  possessed  and  acted  a  very 
different  set  of  performances.  It  may,  indeed,  be  re- 
garded as  certain  that  the  "  Ludus  Coventrise  "  was  not 
acted  by  guilds,  and  that  it  was  exhibited,  not  in  the 
processional  manner  usual  with  those  bodies,  but  upon 
the  large  stationary  platform,  with  separate  "  sedes," 
which  was  essentially  only  a  reproduction  out-of-doors 
of  the  original  mediseval  stage,  i.  e.,  the  nave  and  choir 
of  the  church.  Such  fixed  stages  are  well  known  in  con- 
nection with  the  Cornish  religious  plays  of  the  four- 
teenth century,  and  they  are  represented  in  their  most 
elaborate  development  in  the  sketch  which  illustrates 
the  mise  en  scbne  of  the  first  complete  English  moral- 
ity, "The  Castle  of  Perseverance."  In  many  ways  the 
"  Ludus  Coventrise,"  standing  quite  apart  from  the  con- 
temporary guild  cycles,  forms  a  most  interesting  con- 
necting link  between  the  early  Scriptural  drama  as 
presented  in  the  Church  —  a  species  very  scantily  ex- 
tant in  England  —  and  the  morality  plays  in  which 
strict  religious  didacticism  came  more  and  more  to 


18  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

express  itself  in  proportion  as  it  was  supplanted  by 
secular  elements  in  the  guild  performances. 

The  manuscript  of  the  "  Ludus  Coventrise  "  is  dated 
1468,  and  belongs,  therefore,  to  the  same  period  as 
those  in  which  the  York  and  Wakefield  plays  are  pre- 
served. As  might  be  expected  from  the  fact  of  station- 
ary presentation,  the  individual  scenes  of  the  "  Ludus 
Coventrise"  are  not  so  distinct  as  those  of  the  pro- 
cessional cycles,  where  each  scene  was  produced  by  a 
different  company  of  actors  and  on  a  separate  pageant. 
The  present  cycle  falls  most  naturally  into  four  or  five 
large  groups  of  scenes,  many  individuals  of  which 
cohere  almost  indissolubly,  though  the  groups  as  a 
whole  have  only  the  roughest  connection  with  each 
other.  Between  two  of  these  groups,  indeed,  an  inter- 
mission of  an  entire  year  is  assumed;  that  is,  the  period 
from  the  creation  to  the  betrayal  was  covered  in  one 
year  and  that  from  the  trial  of  Christ  to  Doomsday  in 
the  next.  In  treatment  of  subject  matter  the  "  Ludus 
Coventrise"  bears  more  affinity  to  the  German  passion 
plays  of  the  fifteenth  century,  such  as  that  of  Alsfeld, 
than  to  the  other  English  cycles.  The  didactic  purpose 
is  here  predominant,  and  the  most  notable  feature  of 
mediseval  religion,  the  worship  of  the  Virgin,  is  given 
an  extraordinary  prominence  in  fifteen  plays,  which 
trace  her  history  from  her  conception  and  birth  to  her 
assumption.  The  "Ludus  Coventrise,"  indeed,  is  no 
more  destitute  of  comic  touches  than  the  contemporary 
Biblical  plays  of  Germany  and  France;  and  some  of 
the  humorous  scenes,  such  as  the  coarse  one  between 
the  detractors  in  the  trial  of  Joseph  and  Mary,  are 
vigorous  and  realistic.  But  the  comedy  is  always  inci- 
dental:  it  never  allows  the  reader  to  lose  sight  of  the 


t/mjao 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        19 

religious  significance  of  the  scene;  it  contributes  little 
or  nothing  to  the  growth  of  independence  in  the  con- 
struction of  plot  and  character. 

An  interesting  feature  of  the  "Ludus  Coventrise," 
unparalleled  in  the  other  cycles,  is  the  occasional  in- 
troduction of  allegorical  figures,  after  the  manner  of 
the  morality.  Contemplacio  serves  as  prolocutor  and 
chorus  through  a  large  part  of  the  work;  More  appears 
in  person  to  slay  King  Herod;  and  one  play  even  intro- 
duces a  perfect  little  morality  in  the  debate  of  the  vir- 
tues Misericordia,  Veritas,  Justitia,  and  Pax,  before  the 
three  persons  of  the  Trinity.1  Here  we  find  the  explana- 
tion of  the  existence,  side  by  side,  during  the  first  half  of 
the  Tudor  period  of  the  mystery  and  the  morality;  for 
we  can  understand  how,  as  the  guilds  came  more  and 
more  to  secularize  and  appropriate  to  comic  uses  the 
old  Scriptural  drama,  religious  orthodoxy  was  driven  to 
abandon  that  theme,  and  seek  expression  in  the  newer 
allegorical  form,  —  there  also  to  be  ultimately  expelled. 

We  are  not  sure  of  the  precise  circumstances  under 
which  the  "  Ludus  Coventrise  "  was  acted.  The  cycle  is 
introduced  by  an  argument,  spoken  by  three  vexilla- 
tores,  or  advertising  agents,  who  make  little  mention  of 
the  more  theological  portions,  and  promise,  by  impli- 
cation, at  least,  that  the  whole  play  (intended  accord- 
ing to  the  text  for  performance  in  two  parts  in  con- 
secutive years)  shall  be  presented  "  A  Sunday  next  — 
At  vi.  of  the  belle  —  In  N.  towne."  Various  interpre- 
tations have  been  hazarded,  particularly  for  the  phrase 
"N.  towne."  Northampton  and  Norwich  have  both 
been  suggested,  with  no  very  great  plausibility;  but  the 

1  The  abstract  figures  of  Dolor  and  Misery  are  similarly  intro- 
duced into  the  later  (1505)  version  of  the  Norwich  Grocers'  Pageant. 


80  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

safest  hypothesis  seems  still  to  be  that  "N"  (nomeri) 
means  simply  that  the  name  of  any  town  was  to  be  in- 
serted, according  as  circumstances  might  require.  It 
appears  to  me  most  probable  that  the  "  Ludus  Coven- 
trise "  was  composed  originally  under  the  auspices  of 
some  religious  body,  for  acting  at  some  fixed  place,  one 
half  being  presented  each  year;  and  that  it  later  fell 
into  the  hands  of  a  strolling  company,  such  as  ordi- 
narily acted  moralities,  for  whom  was  written  certainly 
the  prologue,  and  not  improbably  some  of  the  comic 
buffoonery  as  well. 

Fifteenth -century  Scriptural  drama,  produced  in 
apparent  independence  of  the  guild  convention,  is  fur- 
ther exemplified  in  several  miscellaneous  survivals.  A 
Bodleian  manuscript  in  a  northerly  dialect  (E  Museo 
160)  preserves  "a  play  to  be  playede,  on  part  on  gud- 
f riday  af ter-none,  &  the  other  part  opon  Ester  day  after 
the  resurrectione,  in  the  morowe."  The  subjects  are 
those  most  appropriate  to  the  period  of  performance, — 
the  deposition  from  the  cross  and  resurrection;  and 
the  treatment  emphasizes  everywhere  the  devotional, 
rather  than  the  dramatic  possibilities  of  the  theme. 
No  trace  of  humor  appears,  nor  even  the  slightest 
knowledge  of  the  principles  of  stage  presentation;  and 
the  earlier  part  of  the  play,  which  the  scribe  terms  as 
a  whole  a  "treyte  [treatise]  or  meditatione,"  seems 
to  have  been  originally  composed  in  narrative  form. 
Far  the  most  striking  and  poetic  division  of  the  work 
is  its  version  of  the  "  Planctus  Mariae,"  or  lamentation 
of  the  Virgin  over  the  Saviour's  dead  body;  and  this 
passage,  running  to  180  consecutive  lines,  is  conceived 
altogether  in  the  spirit  of  the  contemporary  religious 
lyrics  on  the  same  subject,  with  one  of  which  it  even 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       21 

shares  its  effective  refrain:  "Who  can  not  wepe,  com 
lern  at  me."  l 

Two  unconnected  plays  on  the  story  of  Abraham  and 
Isaac  manifest  a  far  higher  reach  of  dramatic  power 
than  the  "Burial  and  Resurrection,"  just  mentioned; 
but  they  are  equally  devoid  of  humorous  matter  or 
other  trace  of  secular  contamination,  and  there  is  no 
evidence  that  either  belonged  at  any  time  to  a  cycle. 
These  little  dramas,  consisting  of  369  and  465  lines 
each,  are  generally  designated  as  the  Dublin  and  the 
Brome  play,  from  the  respective  localities  where  the 
manuscripts  are  preserved.  It  seems  likely,  however, 
that  the  title  is  in  both  cases  entirely  misleading,  in  so 
far  as  the  original  place  of  performance  is  concerned. 

The  Trinity  College,  Dublin,  manuscript  (D  IV.  18), 
which  contains  the  one  play,  can  be  assigned  by  the 
nature  of  its  varied  contents  to  the  later  years  of 
Henry  VI  (ca.  1458).  The  inclusion  of  a  list  of  the  may- 
ors and  bailiffs  of  Northampton  points  to  the  neigh- 
borhood of  that  town  as  the  district  in  which  the  manu- 
script was  compiled;  and  the  evidence  of  dialect  and 
spelling  in  the  play  itself,  strongly  supports  the  idea 
that  it  originated,  not  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Irish  city, 
where  the  only  text  happens  to  have  found  lodging,  but 
in  one  of  the  midland  counties  of  England. 

It  may  well  be  that  the  chance  which  connects  the 
other  play  of  "Abraham's  Sacrifice,"  with  the  remote 
manor  of  Brome  on  the  borders  of  Norfolk  and  Suf- 
folk, is  as  arbitrary  as  that  which  dictated  that  the 
Northampton  (?)  play  should  come  to  light  in  Dublin. 
It  is  true  that  the  late  fifteenth-century  Brome  manu- 
script is  shown  by  its  interspersed  local  accounts  to 
1  Cf.  Furnivall,  Hymns  to  Virgin,  1867.  126,  127. 


22  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

have  been  written  upon  the  spot  to  which  its  name 
refers  it.  Yet  the  damaged  metre  of  the  play  as  there 
presented,  together  with  the  early  spirit  of  the  piece, 
show  that  the  Brome  scribe  cannot  have  been  the 
original  author.  So,  the  striking  similarity  between  the 
central  portion  of  the  play  (11.  114-315)  and  the  cor- 
responding lines  in  the  Chester  guild  version  of  the 
same  subject,  make  it  fairly  impossible  to  believe  that 
the  entire  breadth  of  England  can  have  interposed 
between  the  conception  of  the  two  works.  This  close 
verbal  parallel  between  the  Chester  and  Brome  plays, 
proving  either  direct  influence  or  a  common  source,  is 
the  more  noteworthy  because  it  is  the  only  instance  in 
which  any  immediate  connection  between  the  different 
dramatic  renderings  of  the  Abraham  story  can  safelj 
be  assumed.  Attempts  have  indeed  been  made  to  re 
late  each  of  the  three  versions  of  Dublin,  Brome,  and 
Chester  to  a  French  original,  but  as  yet  with  no  con- 
vincing result. 

The  Dublin  and  Brome  plays  are  the  finest  of  the 
six  Middle  English  dramas,  dealing  with  Abraham 
and  Isaac.  Quite  distinct  in  form  and  treatment,  they 
both  rank  among  the  most  gravely  affecting  individual 
specimens  of  Scriptural  drama;  and  both  seem  to  have 
taken  their  rise  in  the  early  epoch,  before  the  influences 
of  cyclical  combination  and  secular  performance  had 
weakened  the  independent  character  and  the  moral 
earnestness  of  the  separate  play. 

The  Dublin  text  —  the  shorter  of  the  two  by  a  hun- 
dred lines  —  is  decidedly  the  more  discursive  in  its 
method.  It  introduces  the  figure  of  Sara,  who  does  not 
elsewhere  appear,  and  considerably  elaborates  the 
parts  of  the  angel  and  "Deus."  The  stage  directions 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       23 

indicate  a  large,  fixed  stage,  presenting  four  different 
localities:  Heaven,  the  ground  before  Abraham's 
house,  the  place  where  Abraham  and  Isaac  leave  their 
servants,  and  the  place  of  sacrifice.  At  least  five,  prob- 
ably six,  scenes  can  be  marked  (1-34,  35-83,  84-135, 
136-159?,  160-317,  318-369),  and  the  stage  directions 
infer  a  carefully  planned  mode  of  presentation.1 

In  the  Brome  play,  attention  is  concentrated  almost 
wholly  upon  the  two  main  figures,  and  the  feelings  of 
father  and  son  are  depicted  with  a  pathos  and  truth- 
fulness nowhere  surpassed,  perhaps,  in  the  drama  of  this 
era.  The  piece  is  pretty  obviously  intended  for  the  same 
fixed  stage  employed  by  the  Dublin  play,  but  no  such 
care  is  shown  in  the  discrimination  of  separate  scenes 
or  the  indication  of  changes  of  locality.  Rather,  the 
means  of  effective  stage  action  are  to  a  great  extent 
ignored  in  the  ardor  with  which  the  unknown  author 
pursues  his  main  object  in  the  delineation  of  filial 
piety  and  selfless  devotion  to  the  divine  will.  For  this 
very  reason,  the  Brome  play,  in  spite  of  its  probably 
maimed  and  sophisticated  text,  remains  a  finer  dra- 
matic achievement  than  the  other  piece.  It  is,  indeed, 
the  most  favorable  example  extant  of  the  capabilities 
of  pure  religious  drama,  as  yet  unmixed  with  any 
secular  element,  and  innocent  of  knowledge  concerning 
the  tricks  and  limitations  of  practical  stagecraft. 

One  last  piece  of  English  Scriptural  drama  demands 
consideration,  —  the  very  interesting  play  of  Herod 
and  the  Slaughter  of  the  Innocents,  preserved  in  a 

1  E.  g.,  "Et  vadit  angelus  ad  terram  et  expectat  usque  dum 
Habraham  dicit,"  11.  84,  35;  and  "Et  equitat  [Abraham]  versus 
Sam  in  et  dicit  Sara:  — 

" '  A,  welcome  aoaervtgne,  withoutcn  donte ; 

Bow  haue  ye  fared  whils  ye  baue  ben  oute  ? '"  11. 318,  319. 


24  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Bodleian  manuscript  (Digby  133)  ascribed  to  the  first 
years  of  the  Tudor  era.  This  drama  is  distinctly  in- 
tended for  representation  on  a  fixed  stage,  and  pre- 
sumably under  ecclesiastical  patronage,  for  the  Pro- 
logue states  that  the  performance  occurs  on  St.  Anne's 
Day,  in  remembrance  of  the  mother  of  the  Virgin.  On 
the  previous  year,  we  are  told,  the  same  company  had 
acted  "  in  this  place  "  the  nativity,  with  the  joy  of  the 
shepherds  and  the  three  kings  of  the  East;  while  the 
Epilogue  announces  the  intention  "  the  next  yeer,  as  we 
be  purposid  in  our  mynde,  The  disputacion  of  the 
doctours  to  shew  in  your  presens."  Minstrels  and  vir- 
gins are  referred  to  as  contributing  to  the  "  solace  "  of 
the  audience  and  the  reverence  of  God,  —  in  what  way 
exactly  we  are  not  told.  This  Digby  play,  often  referred 
to  as  "  Candlemas  Day," 1  is  perhaps  the  most  formally 
perfect  mystery  extant,  though  certainly  not  com- 
parable in  genius  with  the  best  work  of  the  guild 
cycles.  The  verse  is  evidently  the  production  of  a  se- 
rious scholar,  probably  a  cleric  and  presumably  the 
"Poeta "  who  speaks  the  words  of  the  Prologue  and 
Epilogue.  The  metrical  form  is  the  same  throughout: 
eight-line  stanzas,  with  the  comparatively  difficult  bal- 
lade arrangement  used  by  Chaucer  in  the  "Monk's 
Tale."  Alliterative  effect  is  also  introduced  carefully, 
though  not  consistently.  The  humor  is  good,  but  much 
more  staid  than  in  the  guild  plays  of  equal  development. 
Herod  boasts  and  threatens  with  a  reserve  of  kingly 
dignity;  and  a  useful  stock  type  appears  in  Watkin, 
the  cowardly  courtier  who  sets  out  to  earn  knighthood 
by  slaying  the  innocents,  but  suffers  an  ignominious 
beating  from  the  distaffs  of  their  mothers.  The  stage 
1  Collier  reads,  "  Childermas  Day,"  ed.  1879,  ii,  156. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        25 

directions  in  this  carefully  prepared  text,  like  those  in 
the  two  other  important  plays  in  the  same  manuscript, 
throw  some  light  on  the  mode  of  presentation  on  the 
fixed  platform,  used  for  the  church  mysteries  and  the 
moralities.  This  stage,  presumably  round,  is  divided 
into  a  number  of  segments  representing,  one  the  court 
of  Herod,  another  the  house  of  Mary  and  Joseph,  an- 
other the  open  place  where  the  children  are  slain,  etc. ; 
and  the  actors  "  go  visiting,"  as  in  children's  games, 
from  one  to  the  other.  After  Herod  has  given  orders 
for  the  execution  of  the  babes,  we  are  told:  "her  the 
knyghtes  and  watkyn  walke  a-bought  the  place  tyll 
Mary  and  loseph  be  convied  in-to  Egipt."  Conse- 
quently, we  have  interpolated  the  scene  in  which  the 
angel  warns  Mary,  the  making  ready  of  the  ass,  and 
the  departure  of  Joseph  and  Mary  with  the  infant 
Jesus.  Then  the  knights  and  Watkin,  who  have  mean- 
time been  walking  about  the  "  place  "  (plated),  or  open 
part  of  the  platform,  not  assigned  particularly  to  any 
locality,  turn  toward  the  mothers  and  begin  the  Slaugh- 
ter of  Innocents. 

All  the  plays  so  far  discussed  belong  to  the  class 
commonly  called  "  mysteries  " ;  that  is,  they  are,  or  pur- 
port to  be,  dramatizations  of  events  described  in  Holy 
Scripture.  The  term  "  mystery  "  has  in  this  sense  no 
authority.  It  seems  to  have  been  first  employed,  in 
1744,  by  the  original  editor  of  Dodsley's  "Collection 
of  Old  Plays,"  who  invented  it  as  a  cognate  of  the 
French  "  mystere,"  the  usual  name  of  a  Scriptural 
play.  During  the  period  when  the  religious  drama 
flourished  in  England,  we  find  such  works  alluded  to 
simply  as  "plays"  or  "pageants,"  or  else  more  techni- 


26  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

cally  as  "miracles."  Nevertheless,  the  exotic  title  of 
Dodsley  is  worth  retaining,  because  it  permits  us  to 
differentiate  between  the  type  of  drama  hitherto 
treated,  based  always,  though  sometimes  remotely,  on 
the  Bible  story;  and  a  sufficiently  different  type  to 
which  the  name  "  miracle "  is  properly  applied. 

These  last  plays  are  sparsely  extant  in  England,  but 
are  known  from  records  to  have  been  once  common,  as 
indeed  might  be  inferred  from  the  circumstance  of  their 
lending  their  specific  name  to  the  entire  category  to 
which  they  belong.1  Miracle  plays,  properly  so  called, 
present  the  life  of  some  saint,  or  depict  some  prodigy 
wrought  in  behalf  of  religion.  Most  frequently  they 
have  nothing  to  do  with  the  Old  or  New  Testament; 
and  the  nature  of  the  subject  matter,  looking  always 
toward  a  sensation  in  the  shape  of  a  miracle  or  con- 
version, would  seem  normally  to  foster  a  more  roman- 
tic and  independent  treatment  than  the  grave  and 
sacred  character  of  the  Bible  itself  would  easily  allow. 
The  first  miracle  play  known  to  have  been  acted  in 
England  is  a  lost  "Ludus  de  Sancta  Katarina,"  written, 
according  to  the  thirteenth-century  chronicler,  Mat- 
thew Paris,  by  one  Geoffrey,  a  Norman,  later  Abbot  of 
St.  Albans,  and  acted  soon  after  1100  at  Dunstable  in 
Bedfordshire.  Costumes  for  the  performance  were  bor- 
rowed from  St.  Albans,  and  accidentally  destroyed 
by  a  conflagration  in  Geoffrey's  house.  The  actors  of 

1  The  earliest  recorded  allusion  to  the  performance  of  non- 
liturgical  plays  in  England  refers  to  miracle  plays  in  the  strict 
sense:  "Lundonia  pro  spectaculis  theatralibus,  pro  ludis  scenicis, 
ludos  habet  sanctiores.  representationes  miraculorum  quae  sancti 
confessores  operati  sunt,  sen  representationes  passionum  quibus  claruit 
constantia  martyrum."  See  Collier,  ed.  1879,  i,  11. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        27 

this  piece  were  schoolboys,  and  Geoffrey,  their  master, 
in  training  them  for  his  drama,  was  anticipating  the 
practice  of  Nicholas  Udall  and  many  another  Eliza- 
bethan pedagogue  or  choir  director.  The  language  of 
Geoffrey's  Ludus  was  presumably  Latin,  possibly 
French ;  English  it  can  hardly  have  been.  It  is  possible 
that  English  drama  may  have  a  like  indirect  claim  to 
the  three  miracle  plays  of  Geoffrey's  contemporary, 
Hilarius,  written  in  Latin  with  occasional  Norman- 
French  insertions. 

Far  more  important,  however,  than  any  of  these 
is  what  seems  to  be  the  first  extant  miracle  fragment 
in  the  English  vernacular,  —  the  fourteenth-century 
"Dux  Moraud,"  preserved  in  a  Bodleian  manuscript, 
to  which  attention  has  only  recently  been  directed.1 
This  piece  is  a  true  theatrical  document,  containing  the 
lines  of  a  single  player,  for  whose  exclusive  use  it  was 
evidently  prepared,  but  giving  no  hint  of  the  speeches 
of  the  other  dramatis  personce.  The  manuscript 
stops,  naturally,  with  the  last  words  of  this  particular 
character,  at  a  point  considerably  antecedent,  it  would 
seem,  to  the  end  of  the  play  as  a  whole,  and  thus  con- 
tains no  allusion  to  the  culminating  wonder,  with  which 
the  drama  must  have  closed.  Fortunately,  the  subject 
of  this  precious  torso  is  so  familiar  from  contemporary 
narrative  versions,  that  it  is  easy  to  conjecture  the 
general  substance  of  the  missing  portion.  The  theme  is 
the  Apollonius  of  Tyre  story  of  paternal  incest,  and  it 
is  the  father  who  speaks  the  268  lines  preserved  by 
chance.  After  two  long  stanzas  invoking  the  audience 
to  avoid  "  janglings"  and  noise,  the  actor  introduces 
himself:  "Duk  Morawd  I  hot  be  name, Korteyser  lord 
1  The  text  was  first  printed  by  W.  Heuser  in  Anglia,  1907. 


28  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

may  be  none. "  He  then  takes  affectionate  leave  of  his 
wife,  who  is  about  to  set  out  on  a  journey,  and  prays 
Jesus  to  save  him  from  "wykyt  thowtes"  during  her 
absence.  Later  speeches  indicate  his  fall  first  into 
guilty  desire  and  then  into  actual  sin,  with  his  resultant 
connivance  at  the  murder  of  his  wife  and  his  daughter's 
child.  In  the  midst  of  his  satisfaction  over  the  removal 
of  these  obstacles  to  secret  guilt,  he  hears  a  bell  ringing 
"  yendyr  in  the  kyrk."  He  betakes  himself  thither,  con- 
fesses to  the  priest,  and  vows  a  penitential  pilgrimage. 
He  takes  leave  of  his  daughter  with  pious  admonition, 
but  that  remorseless  sinner,  angry  at  his  defection, 
hands  him  over  to  an  unspecified  kind  of  death;  and 
his  last  speech  announces :  — 

"  Now  my  lyf  wyl  pase 
Fro  me  this  ilk  stonde  — 
lesu  ful  of  gras 
For-geue  the  this  trespas 

That  thou  ast  don  to  me, 
&  geue  the  gras  to  blyn  [cease] 
Of  that  wykyd  syn 

Quylk  [which]  thou  ast  don  so  fre  — 
lesu  haue  mercy  on  me, 

&  saue  my  sowle  fro  belle  !" 

So  ends  the  father's  part,  but  the  pious  author  of  the 
play  could  hardly  have  been  content  to  leave  the 
daughter  in  a  reprobate  state.  The  story  was  a  favor- 
ite with  mediaeval  homilists,  and  is  related  in  at  least 
three  early  English  metrical  versions,  which  tell  how 
the  daughter,  upon  slaying  her  father,  journeyed  into 
another  country,  where,  after  a  life  of  continued  sin,  she 
was  delivered  from  the  devils  within  her  by  the  godly 
preaching  of  St.  Augustine.  She  confessed  her  crimes, 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        29 

and  died  of  remorse,  whereupon  a  voice  was  heard  to 
announce  from  above:  — 

"  The  sowle  of  this  synfull  wyght 
Is  now  in  heuyn  lyght 

Before  Jhesu  cryst  so  dere."  l 

Somewhat  similarly  we  must  conceive  the  play  to  have 
ended.  Certainly  the  daughter  was  the  main  character 
of  the  piece.  It  is  she  who  performed  the  murder  of 
mother  and  infant,  who  sacrificed  even  her  repentant 
father;  and  it  must  have  been  her  miraculous  or  semi- 
miraculous  redemption,  to  which  the  author  looked  for 
the  climax  and  conclusion  of  his  drama. 

Of  complete  English  miracle  plays  in  the  strict  sense 
there  are  known  only  three,  all  preserved  in  manu- 
scripts which  date  either  from  the  opening  of  the  Tu- 
dor era  or  from  the  generation  immediately  preceding. 
Probably  the  earliest  of  these,  and  certainly  the  purest 
representative  of  the  type,  is  the  "  Play  of  the  Conver- 
sion of  Sir  Jonathas  the  Jew  by  Miracle  of  the  Blessed 
Sacrament,"  which  the  introductory  "banns  "  announce 
the  intention  of  acting  "At  Croxton  on  Monday." 
Seven  distinct  Croxtons  contend  for  the  honor  of  hav- 
ing inspired  this  most  rare  specimen  of  the  early  drama, 
and  it  is  at  present  possible  only  to  assign  it  vaguely 
to  some  locality  of  that  name  in  the  English  Midland. 
The  date  must  be  subsequent  to  1461,  in  which  year 
occurred,  as  we  are  told,  the  miracle  celebrated  by  the 
play.  The  Croxton  drama  has  for  its  purpose  the  asser- 
tion of  that  late  mediaeval  doctrine  of  transubstantia- 
tion,  which  Corpus  Christi  Day  was  set  apart  to  sol- 
emnize, and  which  thus  proved  indirectly  so  fateful  in 

»  Cf.  Herrig's  Archiv,  79  (1887).  424. 


SO  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  development  of  the  "guild  cycles.  The  plot  shows 
how  Sir  Aristorius,  a  merchant  of  Eraclea  in  Aragon,  is 
bribed  by  a  most  unchristian  Jew,  Sir  Jonathas,  to 
steal  the  Host  from  the  altar.  Sir  Jonathas  proceeds, 
with  his  four  Israelitish  servants,  to  maltreat  the  wafer, 
which  bleeds,  causes  Sir  Jonathas  the  loss  of  his  arm, 
and  finally  assumes  the  form  of  the  Saviour  himself, 
converts  the  unbelievers,  and  returns  again  to  the 
shape  of  bread.  The  staging  of  this  play  is  elaborate, 
and  illustrates  well  the  development  which  the  non- 
processional  drama  had  attained  by  the  commence- 
ment of  the  Tudor  period.  Separate  portions  of  the 
platform  are  set  aside  to  represent  the  house  of  Aris- 
torius, that  of  Jonathas,  and  the  church.  The  rest  of 
the  stage  is  unallotted  territory  where  all  parties  may 
meet  to  transact  business,  or  where,  if  they  like,  char- 
acters not  acting  at  the  moment  may  walk  about  with- 
out appearing  to  see  what  is  going  forward.  One  notes 
a  considerable  amount  of  stage  property  and  some 
most  remarkable  effects.  Aristorius  walks  from  his 
house  to  the  church,  apparently  pretends  to  unlock  the 
door,  and  takes  the  Host  from  within.  The  house  of 
Jonathas  contains  a  practicable  table,  caldron,  and 
oven,  and  the  stage  directions  make  demands  whose 
fulfilment  one  would  much  like  to  have  elucidated.  In 
one  place  we  are  told:  "Here  the  (H)  Ost  must  blede; " 
in  another,  "Here  shall  they  pluke  the  arme,  &  the 
hand  shalle  hang  sty  lie  with  the  Sacrament,"  a  picture 
of  horrid  realism  which  suggests  the  plucking  off  of 
Faustus's  leg  by  the  horse  courser.  Later  a  stage  di- 
rection announces,  "Here  shall  the  cawdron  byle,  ap- 
peryng  to  be  as  blood";  and  the  most  puzzling  of  all 
testifies  to  illusion  of  no  simple  order:  "Here  the  ovyn 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        31 

must  ryve  asunder  &  blede  owt  at  the  cranys,  &  an 
image  appere  owt  with  woundis  bledyng."  The  Crox- 
ton  play  contains  some  respectable  humor  of  the 
morality  type,  notably  in  the  figure  of  Coll,  servant  to 
the  quack  physician,  Mr.  Brendych  of  Brabant.1 

Two  other  works  may  be  associated  with  that  just 
discussed  as  being,  at  least  in  part,  "miracles."  They 
are  the  Digby  plays  of  "The  Conversion  of  St.  Paul" 
and  "  Mary  Magdalene."  The  former  is  based  on  the 
"Acts  of  the  Apostles,"  but  is  certainly  to  be  regarded 
rather  as  a  miracle  play  than  as  a  mystery.  It  treats 
the  early  adventures  of  the  apostle  with  the  great- 
est imaginative  freedom,  focussing  interest  upon  his 
miraculous  conversion,  and  closing  with  a  perfunctory 
account  of  his  escape  over  the  walls  of  Damascus.  Of 
the  matters  with  which  the  mystery  writer  would  most 
engage  himself,  should  he  choose  such  a  subject,  — 
Paul's  services  to  Christianity,  his  journeys,  and  final 
martyrdom,  —  there  is  only  the  barest  trace.  The  play 
was  most  probably  written  for  performance  on  the 
Festival  of  the  Conversion  of  St.  Paul  (January  25), 
and  was  presumably  acted  under  the  patronage  of  the 
Church.  Like  the  other  Digby  plays,  this  is  a  work  of 
conscious  literary  art.  It  is  full  of  introductions,  con- 
clusions, and  interpolations  of  the  Poeta  (Miles  Blome- 
field,  if  we  are  to  believe  a  manuscript  note)  who  apolo- 
gizes for  the  pretended  roughness  of  his  almost  painfully 
precise  and  careful  little  drama  with  all  the  mock 

1  The  quack  doctor  and  his  servant  were  long  favorite  figures  in 
popular  drama.  Cf .  Bachelor  Jenkyn,  the  comical  quack's  assistant, 
in  the  Cornish  drama  of  The  Life  of  St.  Meriasek  (MS.,  1504),  and 
the  doctors  in  the  Oxfordshire  and  Lutterworth  St.  George  plays 
(reprinted  Manly,  Specimen*,  I). 


32  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

modesty  of  the  modern  rhymester.  The  mode  of  acting 
of  this  play  is  somewhat  puzzling,  since,  instead  of 
being  presented  continuously  on  a  single  platform  like 
others  of  its  class,  it  is  divided  into  three  distinct 
"stations,"  corresponding  with  the  acts  in  a  modern 
drama.  The  separate  prologues  and  epilogues  to  each 
station  would  suggest  some  processional  form  of  acting, 
and  this  hypothesis  seems  almost  confirmed  by  the 
words  of  the  Poeta  at  the  end  of  the  first  station :  — 

"ffynally  of  this  stacon  we  mak  a  conclusyon, 
besechyng  thys  audyens  to  folow  and  succede 
with  all  your  delygens  this  generall  processyon." 

Perhaps  the  fact  that  the  speech  in  which  these  lines 
occur  is  marked  as  optional  ("Poeta  —  si  placet")  may 
be  taken  to  indicate  that  the  play  was  destined  for 
presentation,  either  continuously  on  a  single  stage,  or 
in  three  parts,  as  circumstances  might  require. 

"The  Conversion  of  St.  Paul"  abounds  in  comic 
matter,  introduced  into  the  historical  plot  in  a  fashion 
neither  more  nor  less  logical  than  that  which  charac- 
terizes the  early  Elizabethan  writers  of  histories  and 
tragedies.  After  the  Poet's  invocation  and  address  to 
the  audience,  Saulus  enters  "goodly  besene  in  the  best 
wyse  lyke  an  aunterous  knyth  [adventurous  knight]," 
breathing  threats  against  the  Christians.  He  secures 
letters  from  Caiaphas  and  Annas  in  view  of  his  jour- 
ney to  Damascus,  and  then  the  stage  direction  notes: 
"here  goyth  sale  forth  a  lytyll  a-syde  for  to  make  hym 
redy  to  ryde,"  leaving  opportunity  for  a  bout  of  low 
badinage  between  his  servant  and  the  hostler.  The 
second  station,  in  which  the  stage  is  divided  between  a 
number  of  localities,  presents  Saul's  vision,  conver- 
sion, and  baptism.  The  third  introduces,  probably  as 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        83 

a  late  interpolation,  a  council  of  devils  who  learn  with 
roars  and  cries  the  desertion  of  their  champion  Saul,  and 
resolve  to  attempt  his  death.  The  rest  is  dull  stuff 
apparently  uncongenial  to  the  writer,  who  breaks  off 
abruptly  and  sums  up  the  conclusion  in  an  epilogue. 

One  of  the  most  significant  monuments  of  early 
English  dramatic  literature  is  the  long,  rambling,  and 
only  sporadically  readable  play  of  "Mary  Magdalene," 
which  combines  in  a  remarkable  fashion  the  types  of 
mystery,  miracle  play,  and  morality.  The  fifty-two 
scenes  were  all  presented  on  the  same  stage,  portions 
of  which  seem  to  have  been  made  to  represent  eleven 
different  places,  ranging  from  Hell  to  the  court  of 
Caesar  and  the  kingdom  of  Marcylle.1  The  literary  pre- 
tensions of  all  the  Digby  plays  become  particularly 
evident  in  this,  the  longest  of  the  series,  which,  if  the 
last  two  lines  of  the  Epilogue  are  to  be  taken  seriously, 
must  be  regarded  as  the  first  closet  drama  in  English 
history:  — 

"  I  desyer  the  redars  to  be  my  frynd, 
Yff  ther  be  ony  amysse,  that  to  amend." 

Notwithstanding  this  appeal  to  the  reading  public, 
which  may,  indeed,  have  been  added  by  the  scribe  who 
made  the  Digby  copy,  we  must  suppose  the  play  in- 
tended for  actual  presentation.  The  first  part  of  the 
work  is  predominantly  of  the  mystery  type.  Tiberius 
Caesar,  Herod,  and  Pilate  are  introduced  in  the  popu- 
lar braggart  rdle,  which  was  by  this  time  become  the 
conventional  stage  mark  of  a  ruler.  Then  Mary's  his- 
tory is  presented :  her  father's  death ;  her  fall,  life  in  sin, 

1  A  conjectural  plan  of  the  stage  used  for  the  performance  of  Mary 
Magdalene  will  be  found  in  V.  E.  Albright's  Shaksperian  Stage. 


34  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

repentance;  her  washing  of  Christ's  feet  in  the  house 
of  Simon  the  Leper;  the  death  and  recall  to  life  of  her 
brother  Lazarus;  finally,  her  experiences  on  the  morn- 
ing of  the  Resurrection.  The  second  portion  of  the 
drama,  which  partly  overlaps  the  first,  is  pure  miracle 
play.  It  narrates  the  conversion  by  Mary  of  the 
heathen  king  and  queen  of  Marcylle  after  several 
spectacular  miracles;  the  subsequent  pilgrimage  and 
adventures  of  these  energetic  converts;  Mary's  retire- 
ment into  the  wilderness  and  saintly  death.  The  pic- 
ture of  the  heroine's  alienation  from  virtue,  which  is 
probably  the  most  dramatic  portion  of  the  work,  is  an 
almost  perfect  example  of  the  morality  play  embedded 
in  a  foreign  setting.  Mary's  temptation  comes  as  the 
result  of  a  conference  between  the  great  allegorical 
dignitaries,  the  World,  the  Flesh,  and  the  Devil,  who 
from  their  retainers,  the  seven  deadly  sins,  depute 
Lechery  to  decoy  her  into  evil.  Lechery  entices  her  vic- 
tim into  a  tavern,  where  in  an  excellent  scene  of  low 
realism,  Mary  yields  to  the  love  of  the  gallant  Curiosity. 
In  range  and  workmanship  "Mary  Magdalene"  is 
probably  a  very  fair  sample  of  the  drama  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  Tudor  epoch.  It  is  evident  that  by  this  time 
not  only  the  frankly  secular  guild  plays,  but  also  the 
more  conservative  sort  of  drama,  which  in  a  sense  con- 
tinued the  ecclesiastical  tradition  and  influence,  had 
come  to  assert  artistic  independence,  and  even  in  some 
cases  a  distinct  literary  consciousness.  Comedy  min- 
gles everywhere  with  tragedy  in  a  league  unbroken  till 
the  Restoration ;  while  in  the  miracle  plays  the  drama 
enters  a  third  rich  field  of  wonder  and  romance,  equally 
remote  from  the  serious  realism  of  Biblical  history  and 
from  the  comic  realism  of  village  life,  but  productive 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        85 

in  future  of  some  of  the  greatest  triumphs  of  the 
mature  theatre.  Stagecraft  and  stage  business  have 
attained  considerable  development  and  established 
permanent  conventions,  both  on  the  normal  fixed  and 
sub-divided  platform,  and  in  connection  with  the  more 
gorgeous  processional  pageant  which  resulted  from  the 
exigencies  of  guild  presentation.  Most  significant  of 
all,  the  "Ludus  Coventrise"  and  "Mary  Magdalene" 
both  show  well-developed  nlorality  plays  arising  out 
of  mysteries.  The  concrete  figures  of  the  primitive  re- 
ligious drama  are  losing  their  vividness  for  playwright 
and  for  public,  and  tend  either  themselves  to  pass  into, 
or  to  give  place  to,  moral  abstractions.  The  Herod, 
Pilate,  and  Joseph  of  Skelton's  time  and  Shakespeare's 
were  felt  as  types,  not  men,  and  the  ascendancy  of  the 
typical  in  religious  drama  meant,  of  course,  the  tri- 
umph of  the  morality,  to  which  it  is  time  that  we  turn 
our  attention. 

One  last  important  consideration  remains  to  be  em- 
phasized. The  mystery  play,  particularly  as  repre- 
sented in  the  great  guild  cycles,  is  the  only  form  of 
English  literature  which  passed  essentially  unaltered 
through  the  early  sixteenth-century  welter  of  Renais- 
sance and  Reformation.  Those  drastic  reformers  of 
life  and  letters,  Erasmus,  Colet,  Wyatt,  Surrey,  Crom- 
well, and  the  rest,  scattered  broadcast  new  influences 
and  new  ideas,  but  they  did  not  disturb  the  tranquil 
conservatism  of  the  Corpus  Christi  plays.  In  1572, 
the  mayor  of  Chester,  John  Hanky,  "would  needs 
have  the  Playes  (commonly  called  Chester  Playes)  to 
go  forward,  against  the  wills  of  the  Bishops  of  Canter- 
bury, York,  and  Chester";  and  his  successor,  Sir  John 
Savage,  in  1575,  "caused  the  Popish  Plays  of  Chester 


36  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

to  be  played  the  Sunday,  Munday,  Tuesday,  and 
Wednesday  after  Mid-sommer-day,  in  contempt  of  an 
Inhibition  and  the  Primats  Letters  from  York,  and 
from  the  Earl  of  Huntington."  What  had  been  good 
doctrine  to  Ranulph  Higden  in  1328  had  become  pesti- 
lent heresy  in  the  course  of  two  and  a  half  centuries, 
but  the  burghers  still  demanded  the  old  diversion, 
and  they  got  it  in  the  old  form  till  a  newer  one  was 
ready. 

We  know  that  several  of  the  most  popular  scenes  in 
the  mystery  cycles  had  already  established  themselves 
in  universal  favor  and  familiarity,  when  Chaucer  was 
writing  the  "Canterbury  Tales."  In  the  Miller's  Tale 
the  poet  alludes  to  the  horse-play  between  Noah  and 
his  wife:  — 

"'Hastow  nat  herd,'  quod  Nicholas,  'also 
The  sorwe  of  Noe  with  his  felawshipe, 
Er  that  he  mighte  gete  his  wyf  to  shipe  ? 
Him  had  be  lever,  I  dar  wel  undertake, 
At  thilke  tyme,  than  alle  hise  wetheres  blake, 
That  she  hadde  had  a  ship  hir-self  allone.' " 

And  of  another  of  the  lovers  of  the  fair  Alisoun,  he  says 
in  the  same  tale :  — 

"Somtyme,  to  shewe  his  lightnesse  and  maistrye, 
He  pleyeth  Herodes  on  a  scaffold  hye." 

What  Chaucer  had  seen,  we  cannot  doubt  that  Shake- 
speare had  also  seen,  and  the  antics  of  the  unfortunate 
Absolon  can  hardly  have  varied  much  from  those  of 
the  actors,  detested  of  Hamlet,  whom  Shakespeare  had 
seen  out-Heroding  Herod  on  the  guild  pageants  of 
Coventry  and  the  boards  of  a  somewhat  more  ad- 
vanced London  stage. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        87 

We  are  accustomed  to  think  of  the  Elizabethan 
drama  as  a  great  mushroom  growth,  evoked  over-night, 
as  it  were,  by  special  conditions  due  to  Renaissance  and 
Reformation  and  half  a  dozen  other  new  impulses. 
And  such  it  truly  was.  We  shall  find  it  enormously 
cosmopolitan  in  its  origins,  and  in  its  interests  ex- 
traordinarily contemporary,  even  ephemeral.  This 
was  the  character  of  the  age,  and  it  affected  other 
branches  of  literature  in  equal  measure.  But  when  we 
come  to  estimate  the  sources  whence  the  Elizabethan 
drama  derives  the  particular  vigor  and  depth  of  root 
which  it  possesses  above  all  the  other  literary  forms  of 
the  time,  who  shall  say  just  how  potent  was  the  fact 
that  the  drama  alone  could  boast,  through  the  guild 
plays,  an  uninterrupted  descent  from  English  literature 
of  the  Middle  Ages  ?  These  plays,  orally  presented 
throughout  the  country  year  after  year,  form  the  only 
real  bond  of  sympathy  between  the  English  public  of 
Shakespeare's  youth  and  the  great  English  public  of 
Chaucer's  day.  Through  them  passed  into  the  drama  a 
wealth  of  tradition  and  sentiment  elsewhere  intercepted 
by  changes  of  language,  religion,  and  education.  To 
the  conservatism  and  tenacity  of  the  guild  perform- 
ances Elizabethan  drama  owes  a  good  deal  of  the  un- 
conquerable national  quality,  which  enabled  it  to  as- 
similate larger  portions  of  foreign  matter  than  any 
other  literary  type  of  the  day  and  yet  remain  the  most 
essentially  English  of  them  all.  The  guild  plays  thus 
did  much  to  save  the  drama  from  that  unfortunate  dis- 
continuity generated  by  the  upheavals  of  the  early  six- 
teenth century,  which  in  the  other  branches  made  it 
impossible  for  Spenser  properly  to  appreciate  Chaucer 
or  for  Ascliam  to  sympathize  with  Malory. 


38  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 
GENERAL  WORKS  OF  REFERENCE 

Bates,  Katharine  Lee  :  The  English  Religious  Drama,  1893. 

Cambridge  History  of  English  Literature,  vols.  v,  vi,  1910. 

Chambers,  E.  K. :   The  Mediceval  Stage,  1903. 

Collier,  J.  P.  :  The  History  of  English  Dramatic  Poetry  to  the 
Time  of  Shakespeare :  and  Annals  of  the  Stage  to  the  Restora- 
tion, 3  vols.,  2d  edition,  1879. 

Courthope,  W.  J.  :  History  of  English  Poetry,  1895-1905,  vols. 
ii-iv. 

Creizenach,  W. :  Geschichte  des  neueren  Dramas,  1893-1910 
(4  vols.). 

Hazlitt,  W.  C. :  The  English  Drama  and  Stage  under  the  Tudor 
and  Stuart  Princes,  1543-1668.  Illustrated  by  a  Series  of  Docu- 
ments, Treatises,  and  Poems,  1869. 

Herford,  C.  H. :  Studies  in  the  Literary  Relations  of  England 
and  Germany  in  the  Sixteenth  Century,  1886. 

Jusserand,  J. :  Le  Theatre  en  Angleterre,  Paris,  1878,  new  ed., 
1881. 

:  A  Literary  History  of  the  English  People,  3  vols., 

1895-1909.  French  ed.,  1896-1904. 

Kelly,  W.  :  Notices  Illustrative  of  the  Drama  and  other  Popular 
Amusements,  chiefly  in  the  Sixteenth  and  Seventeenth  Centuries, 
1865. 

Klein,  J.  L.  :  Geschichte  des  Dramas,  1865-76,  vols.  xii,  xiii. 

Lee,  Sidney  :  The  French  Renaissance  in  England.  An  Ac- 
count of  the  Literary  Relations  of  England  and  France  in  the 
Sixteenth  Century,  1910. 

Malone,  E.  :  A  n  Historical  A  ccount  of  the  Rise  and  Progress 
of  the  English  Stage,  and  of  the  Economy  and  Usages  of 
our  Ancient  Theatres.  Shakespeare's  Works,  ed.  1790,  vol.  i, 
part  2.  Enlarged  version  in  Boswell's  Malone,  18'21,  vol.  iii, 
together  with  Farther  Account  by  George  Chalmers  (pp.  410- 
522). 

Prolss,  R. :  Geschichte  des  neueren  Dramas,  3  vols.,  1881-83, 
vols.  i,  ii. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        39 

Schelling,  F.  E.  :    Elizabethan  Drama,   1558-1642  .  .  .  with 

Resume  of  the  Earlier  Drama,  2  vols.,  1908. 
:  English  Literature  during  the  Lifetime  of  Shakespeare, 

1910. 
Symonda,  J.   A.  :    Shakspere's    Predecessor*    in  the   English 

Drama,  1881. 
Ten  Brink,  B.  :  Geschichte  der  englischen  Litteratur,  revised  by 

A.  Brandl,  1893.   Translated,  H.  M.  Kennedy,  1883. 
Ward,  A.  W.  :  History  of  English  Dramatic  Literature  to  the 

Death  of  Queen  Anne,   2d  ed.,  3  vols.,  1899. 
Warton,  Thomas  :  History  of  English  Poetry  from  the  Twelfth 

to  the  Close  of  the  Sixteenth  Century,  4  vola.,  1791-81.  Ed. 

W.  C.  Hazlitt,  1871. 

IMPORTANT  COLLECTIONS  OF  TEXTS  FROM  THE 
TUDOR  PERIOD 

Amyot,  T.,  and  others  :  A  Supplement  to  Dodsley's  Old  English 
Plays,  4  vols.,  1853. 

Brandl,  A.  :  Quellen  des  weltlichen  Dramas  in  England  vor 
Shakespeare.  Em  Ergdnzungsband  zu  Dodsley's  Old  English 
Plays.  "  Quellen  und  Forschungen,"  lux,  1898. 

Bullen,  A.  H. :  A  Collection  of  Old  English  Plays,  4  vols., 
1882-85. 

Child,  P.  J.  :  Four  Old  Plays,  1848. 

Collier,  J.  P. :  Five  Old  Plays,  1851.  Reprinted,  Hazlitt'i 
Dodsley,  vi. 

:  Illustrations  of  Early  English  Popular  Literature. 

(Dilke,  C.  W.)  :  Old  English  Plays,  6  vols.,  1814-15. 

Digby  Plays  :  (Contents  of  the  Bodleian  MS.,  "  Digby  133.") 
Printed  Th.  Sharp,  Abbotsford  Club,  1835 ;  F.  J.  Furnivall 
(together  with  a  play  of  The  Burial  and  Resurrection  from 
another  MS.),  New  Shakespeare  Society,  1882,  reprinted, 
E.  E.  T.  S.,  1896.  Discussion:  K.  Schmidt,  "Die  Digby- 
Spiele  "  (Berlin  dissertation),  1884  :  concluded  in  Anglia, 
viii  (1885),  371  ff. 

Dodaley,  Robert :  A  Select  Collection  of  Old  Plays,  12  vols., 
1744.  Second  ed.,  I.  Reed,  1780.  Third  ed.,  J.  P.  Collier, 
1825-27.  Fourth  ed.,  W.  C.  Hazlitt  (enlarged  to  15  vola.> 
1874-76.  The  contents  vary  somewhat  in  each  edition. 


40  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Everyman's  Library.  "  Everyman "  with  other  Interludes,  in* 
eluding  Eight  Miracle  Plays,  1909. 

Everyman's  Library.  Minor  Elizabethan  Drama,  ed.  A.  H. 
Thomdike,  2  vols. 

Farmer,  J.  S. :   Tudor  Facsimile  Texts,  1907-11.   (In  progress.) 

:  Early  English  Drama  Society  Publications.  (A  series 

of  unauthoritative  reprints.) 

Gayley,  C.  M.  (general  editor)  :  Representative  English  Come- 
dies, with  Introductory  Essays  and  Notes  .  .  .  by  various  writers. 
From  the  Beginnings  to  Shakespeare,  1903. 

Hawkins.  Thomas :  The  Origin  of  the  English  Drama,  Illus- 
trated in  its  various  Species,  viz. :  Mystery,  Morality,  Tragedy, 
and  Comedy,  by  Specimens  from  our  Earliest  Writers,  3  vols., 
Oxford,  1773. 

Hemingway,  S.  B. :  English  Nativity  Plays.  "  Yale  Studies 
in  English,"  xxxviii,  1909. 

Hurst,  Robinson,  &  Co.  (Publishers):  The  Old  English  Drama, 
2  vols.,  1825.  (A  collection  of  eight  plays  with  separate  im- 
prints.) 

Litterarhistorische  Forschungen. 

Manly,  J.  M.  :  Specimens  of  the  Pre-Shaksperean  Drama,  2 
vols.,  Boston,  1897. 

Materialien  zur  Kunde  des  alteren  englischen  Dramas. 
General  editor,  W.  Bang.  Louvain,  1902,  etc. 

Marriott,  William  :  Collection  of  English  Miracle  Plays  or  Mys- 
teries. Basel,  1838. 

Neilson,  W.  A.  :  Chief  Elizabethan  Dramatists,  1911. 

Old  English  Drama,  3  vols.,  1830. 

Pollard,  A.  W. :  English  Miracle  Plays,  Moralities,  and  Interludes, 
Specimens  and  Extracts.  Oxford,  1890.  5th  ed.,  revised,  1909. 

(Scott,  Walter)  :  The  Ancient  British  Drama.  In  Three  Vol- 
umes. Printed  for  William  Miller.  The  editor's  name  no- 
where appears. 

Simpson,  Richard  :  The  School  of  Shakspere,  2  vols.  (pub- 
lished posthumously),  1878.  Also  a  separate  pamphlet,  con- 
taining A  Larum  for  London,  published  under  the  same 
general  title,  1872. 

Waterhouse,  O.  :  The  Non-Cycle  Mystery  Plays,  together  with 
the  Croxton  Play  of  the  Sacrament  and  the  Pride  of  Life. 
E.  E.  T.  S.,  1909. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA        41 

In  addition  to  the  above,  the  following  academic  periodicals 
and  publications  of  learned  societies  are  particularly  valuable 
repositories  of  dramatic  texts  :  — 

Anglia. 

Englische  Studien. 

(Herrig's)  Archiv  fur  das  Studium  der  neueren  Sprachen. 

Jahrbuch  der  deutschen  Shakespeare-Gesellschaft.  (5A.-J6.) 

Shakespeare  Society  Publication*  (1841-53). 

New  Shakspere  Society  Publications  (1874-96). 

Malone  Society  Publications  (1907,  etc.). 

SPECIAL  BIBLIOGRAPHY  TO  CHAPTER  I 
GENERAL  DISCUSSION 

Beatty,  Arthur  :  The  St.  George,  or  Mummers'  Plays  ;  a  Study 

in  the  Protology  of  the  Drama.    Wise.  Acad.  of  Sciences,  Arts, 

&  Letters,  xv,  pt.  2.  1906. 
Bolingbroke,  L.  O.  :  "  Pre-Elizabethan  Plays  and  Players  in 

Norfolk,"  Norfolk  Archceology,  xi  (1892),  332-351. 
Cook,  A.  8.  :  "A  Remote   Analogy   to   the  Miracle  Play," 

Journal  of  Germanic  Philology,  iv,  421-451. 
Davidson,  Charles  :    Studies  in  the  English  Mystery  Plays. 

Yale  diss.  1892. 
Ebert,  A.  :  "  Die  englischeu  Mysterien."  Jb.  fur  ram.  u.  engl. 

Lit.,  i.  1859. 

Gay  ley,  C.  M.  :  Plays  of  our  Forefathers,  1907. 
Graaf,  W.  van  der  :  "  Miracles  &  Mysteries  of  S.  E.  York- 
shire "  (Notes  concerning  Patrington  &  Hedon),  Eng.  Stud., 

36  (1906),  228-230. 
Greene,  Antoinette  :  "  An  Index  to  the  Non-Biblical  Names 

in  the  English  Mystery  Plays,"  Studies  in  Honor  of  J.  M. 

Hart,  1910,  313-350. 
Hohlf eld,  Alexander  :  "  Die  altenglischen  Kollektivmisterien 

unter  besondererBerUcksichtigungder  Vcrhiiltnisse  der  York- 

und  Towneley-Spiele,"  Anglia,  xi,  219-310. 
Hone,  William  :    Ancient    Mysteries   described,  especially  tht 

English  Miracle  Plays  .  .  .  London,  1823. 
Jusaerand,  J.  J. :  "A  note  on  Pageants  and  '  Scaffolds  Hye,' " 

Furnivall  Miscellany,  1901,  183  ff. 


42  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Leach,  A.  P. :  "  Some  English  Plays  and  Players,  1220-1548," 
Furnivall  Miscellany,  1901,  205  ff. 

Matthews,  Brander  :  "  The  Medieval  Drama/'  Modern 
Philology,  i,  71-94.  1903. 

Oliver,  Q.  :  "  A  History  of  the  Holy  Trinity  Guild  at  Sleaford, 
with  an  Account  of  its  Miracle  Plays,  Religious  Mysteries, 
and  Shows,  as  practised  iu  the  15th  Century."  Lincoln,  1837. 

Stoddard,  F.  H. :  References  for  Students  of  Miracle  Plays  and 
Mysteries,  1887. 

Taylor,  Gh  C. :  "  The  English  Planctus  Mari»,"  Modern 
Philology,  iv  (1907),  605-637. 

Thien,  H.  :  Vber  die  englischen  Marienldagen.  Kiel,  1906. 

Tiadel,  F.  M.  :  Comedy  in  the  Mystery  Plays  of  England.  Har- 
vard thesis,  1906. 

•  "  The  Influence  of  Popular  Customs  on  the  Mystery 

Plays,"  Jrl  Engl.  and  Germ.  Phil.,  v,  323-340. 

INDIVIDUAL  PLAYS,  TEXTS  AND  COMMENTARY 
I.    SCRIPTURAL  DRAMA 

1.    SPECIMENS   APPARENTLY   ANTECEDENT   TO    THE    FORMATION    OP 
THE    GUILD    CYCLES 

(a)  Specimens  of  English  "  tropes."  Contained  in  Rcgu- 
laris  Concordia  Monachorum  (?  967 ;  by  St.  Ethan- 
wold  ?).  Ed.  W.  S.  Logeman,  Anglia,  xiii,  426-428  : 
The  Winchester  Troper,  ed.  W.  H.  Frere.  Henry  Brad- 
shaw  Society,  1894.  Extracts  are  reprinted  by 
Manly,  Specimens,  i,  xix-xxvi. 

(6)  Harrowing  of  Hell.  Extant  in  three  MSS.  Reprinted, 
parallel  texts  (with  Gospel  of  Nicodemns),  W.  H. 
Hulme,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1907.  Other  editions :  E.  Mall, 
Berlin,  1871 ;  Pollard,  English  Miracle  Plays.  Discus- 
sion :  K.  Young,  "  The  Harrowing  of  Hell  in  Liturgical 
Drama."  Reprinted  from  Trans.  Wis.  Academy,  xvi, 
pt.  2,  1909. 

(c)  Shrewsbury  Fragments.  Printed  W.  W.  Skeat,  Acad- 
emy, Jan.  11, 1890  ;  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897  ;  Water- 
house,  Non-Cycle  Mystery  Plays,  1909.  Discussed  W. 
W.  Skeat,  Academy,  Jan.  4,  1890. 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       43 

(d)  Cornish  Drama.  Norris,  E.  :  The  Ancient  Cornish 
Drama  (Cornish  text  of  3  mystery  plays  with  transla- 
tion), Oxford,  1859,  2  vols.  Discussion :  Peter,  T.  C.  : 
"  The  Old  Cornish  Drama.  A  Lecture,"  1906. 
Creation  of  the  World.  Cornish  text  and  translation 
by  Davies  Gilbert,  1827. 

2.    GUILD    PLATS 

(a)  Chester  Cycle.  MS.  of  Play  24  only  (prompter's  copy  ?) 
ascribed  to  1475-1500.  5  complete  MSS.  dated  from 
1591  to  1607.  MS.  containing  fragment  of  play  19 
printed  Manchester  Guardian,  May  19,  1883.  Ed.  Th. 
Wright  for  Shakespeare  Society,  2  vols.  1843-47.  Plays 
i-xiii,  ed.  H.  Deimling,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1892  ;  remainder 
announced  for  1911-12.  Plays  3,  10,  and  Banns  ed. 
J.  H.  Markland,  Roxburghe  Club,  1818.  Discussion: 
J.  H.  Markland,  "  Chester  Mysteries  "  (dated  1818), 
printed  in  vol.  iii,  pp.  525-549,  of  Boswell-Malone 
Shakespeare,  1821.  H.  Deimling :  Textgestalt  und 
Textkritik  der  Chester  Plays,  Berlin  diss.,  1890.  H. 
Ungemach  :  "  Die  Quellen  der  fiinf  ersten  Chester 
Plays,"  Munchener  Beitrtige,  i,  1890. 

(6)  True  Coventry  Cycle.  Two  Coventry  Corpus  Christi 
Plays,  ed.  H.  Craig,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1902.  Other  editions: 
Shearmen-Taylors'  Pageant,  Th.  Sharp,  1817  and 
1825  ;  Marriott,  1838.  Manly,  Specimens,  1897  ;  A.  W. 
Pollard  :  Fifteenth  Century  Prose  and  Verse,  1903.  Weav- 
ers' Pageant,  J.  B.  Grade  ?  for  Abbotsford  Club,  1836; 
F.  Holthausen  :  "  Das  Spiel  der  Weber  von  Coventry, 
i,  Text,"  Anglia,  xxv,  209-250,  1902.  Discussion: 
Thomas  Sharp :  A  Dissertation  on  the  Pageants  or 
Dramatic  Mysteries  Anciently  performed  at  Coventry,  by 
the  Trading  Companies  of  that  City,  Coventry,  1825  ; 
C.  Davidson,  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  vii.  184 ;  A.  R.  Hohl- 
feld,  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  vii.  318. 

(c)  Newcastle  Shipwrights'  Play  of  Noah's  Ark.  Edi- 
tions :  Henry  Bourne  :  The  History  of  Neiocastle-upon- 
Tyne,  1736  ;  John  Brand  :  The  History  and  Antiquities 
of  Newcastle-upon-Tyne,  1789  ;  Th.  Sharp  :  Disserta- 


44  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tion,  1825  ;  F.  Holthausen  :  Goteborgs  Hogskolas  Ars- 
skrift,  1897,  vol.  iii  ;  R.  Brotanek  :  "  Noahs  Arche.  Ein 
Misterium  aus  Newcastle-npou-Tyue,"  Anglia,  xxi 
(1899),  165-200  (Reprint  of  Sharp,  with  parallel  "  re- 
stored "  text)  ;  O.  Waterhouse  :  Non-Cycle  Mystery 
Plays,  1909. 

(d)  Norwich  Grocers'  Play  of  Adam  and  Eve.  Two 
MS.  texts  (1533, 1565).  Editions :  Robert  Fitcb,  Nor- 
folk ArchoBology,  v,  8-31,  1859  (both  texts)  ;  J.  M. 
Mauly,  Specimens,  i,  1897  ;  O.  Waterhouse,  Non-  Cycle 
Mystery  Plays,  1909.  Discussion :  Henry  Harrod,  "  A 
Few  Particulars  concerning  Early  Norwich  Pageants," 
Norfolk  Archaeology,  iii  (1852),  3-18. 

(«)  Wakefield  (Towneley)  Cycle.  MS.  long  in  library  of 
Towneley  Hall ;  now  in  private  possession  at  Ewell, 
Surrey.  Editions :  —  Surtees  Society,  1836  ;  G.  England 
and  A.  W.  Pollard,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1897.  Play  xxx,  F. 
Douce,  Roxburghe  Club,  1822.  Discussion:  A.  Bun- 
zen,  Ein  Beitrag  zur  Kritik  der  Wakefelder  Mysterien, 
1903;  F.  W.  Cady,  "The  Liturgical  Basis  of  the 
Towneley  Mysteries,"  Pub.  Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.,  1909  ; 
M.  H.  Peacock,  "The  Wakefield  Mysteries.  The 
place  of  representation,"  Anglia,  xxiv  (1901),  509 ; 
W.  W.  Skeat,  "  The  Locality  of  the  Towneley  Plays," 
Athenceum,  Dec.  2,  1893.  A.  Ebert :  "  Die  engl.  Mys- 
terien, mit  besonderer  Beriicksichtigung  der  Towne- 
ley-Samralung "  :  Jb.  f.  rom.  u.  engl.  Lit.,  i,  44,  131. 
H.  A.  Eaton  :  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xiv,  265,  "  A  Source 
for  the  Towneley  Prima  Pastorura."  J.  Hugienin  : 
Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xiv,  255,  "  An  Interpolation  in  the 
Towneley  Abraham  Play." 

(/)  York  Cycle.  Lucy  Toulmin  Smith,  The  Plays  per- 
formed by  the  Crafts  or  Mysteries  of  York  on  the  Day  of 
Corpus  Christi  in  the  14, 15,  and  16  Centuries,  Oxford, 
1885.  Scriveners'  Play  of  Incredulity  of  Thomas 
preserved  in  separate  MS.  belonging  to  York  Philoso- 
phical Soc.  Printed  J.  Croft,  Excerpta  Antiqua,  1797  ; 
J.  P.  Collier,  Camden  Misc.  iv,  1859,  Discussion :  H. 
E.  Coblentz,  "  A  Rime-Index  to  the  '  Parent  Cycle  '  of 
the  York  Mystery  Plays  and  of  a  portion  of  the  Wood- 


SCRIPTURAL  AND  MIRACLE  DRAMA       45 

kirk  (i.  «.,  Wakefield)  Conspiracio  et  Capito,"  Pub. 
Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.,  x  (1895),  487-557  ;  Craigie,  W.  A.: 
"The  Gospel  of  Nicodeums  and  the  York  Mystery 
Plays,"  Furnivall  Miscellany,  1901  ;  O.  Herrtrich, 
Studien  zu  der  York  Plays,  Breslau,  1886  ;  F.  Holt- 
hausen,  "  Beitrage  zur  Erkliirung  und  Textkritik  der 
York  Plays,"  Herrig's  Archiv,  85  (1890),  411-428  (with 
"  Nachtriige,"  Archiv,  86)  ;  "  Zur  Textkritik  der  York 
Plays,"  Phil.  Stud.  Festgabe  ftir  E.  Sievert,  Halle, 
1896  ;  Kamann,  P.,  "  Die  Quellen  der  York-Spiele," 
Anglia,  x,  189-226;  E.  Kolbing,  "Beitrage  zur  Er- 
klarung  und  Textkritik  der  York  Plays,"  Engl.  Studien, 
xx  (1895),  179-220 ;  K.  Luick  :  "  Zur  Textkritik  der 
Spiele  TOU  York,"  Anglia,  22,  384. 

8.    BCBIPTUBAL  PLAT8  APPARENTLY  INDEPENDENT  OF  THE  GUILDS 

(a)  The  so-called  "Ludua  Coventriae"  cycle.  Edited  by 
J.  O.  Halliwell,  Shakespeare  Society,  1841.  Plays  i-v. 
Dugdale,  Monasticon  Anglicanum.  —  Discussion  :  Ernst 
Falke,  "  Die  Quellen  des  Sogenannten  Ludus  Coven- 
triae," Leipzig,  1908  ;  Max  Kramer,  "  Sprache  und 
Heimat  des  sog.  Ludus  Coventriae,"  Halle,  a.  S.,  1892  ; 

E.  N.  S.  Thompson,  "  The  Ludus  Coventriae,"  Mod. 
Lang.  Notes,  xxi  (1896),  18-20. 

(&)  Christ's  Burial  and  Resurrection.  Wright,  Reliquae 
Antiquae,  ii,  124,  1843 ;  Printed  in  Digby  Mysteries,  ed. 
Furnivall,  1882  and  1896. 

(c)  Abraham's   Sacrifice.     Brome  MS. —  Editions:   Miss 

L.  Toulmin  Smith,  Anglia,  vii  (1884),  316-337,  and  "  A 
Commonplace  Book  of  the  Fifteenth  Century,"  1886  ; 
Walter  Rye,  Norfolk  Antiquarian  Miscellany,  iii,  1887; 
J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897;  O.  Waterhouse,  Non- 
Cycle  Mystery  Plays,  1909.  —  Discussion  :  A.  Hohlfeld, 
"Two  Old  English  Mystery  Plays  on  the  Subject  of 
Abraham's  Sacrifice,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  v,  222-237; 

F.  Holthausen,  Anglia,  xiii  (1891),  361. 

(d)  Abraham's  Sacrifice.    Dublin  MS.  —  Editions:  J.  P. 

Collier,  "Five  Miracle  Plays,"  1836(25  copies);  R. 
Brotanek,  "  Abraham  und  Isaak.  Ein  ME  Misterium 


46  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

aus  einer  Dubliner  Handschrift,"  Anglia,  xxi  (1899), 
21-55.  —  Discussion  :  C.  Davidson,  "  Concerning  Eng- 
lish Mystery  Plays,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  vii  (1892), 
339-341. 

(e)  Candlemas  (Childermas?)  Day  (Slaughter  of  Inno- 
cents). Digby  MS.  Reprinted  separately,  Hawkins,  vol. 
i,  1773  ;  Marriott,  1838. 

II.  MIRACLE  DRAMA 

(a)  Dux  Maraud,  "  einzelrolle  aus  einem  verlorenen  drama 

des  14.  Jh.,"  W.  Heuser,  Anglia,  30  (1907),  180  S. 

(b)  Croxton  Play  of  the  Sacrament.  —  Editions :  Whitley 

Stokes,  Transactions  Phil.  Soc.,  Appendix,  1861;  J.  M. 
Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897;  O.  Waterhouse,  Non-Cycle 
Mystery  Plays,  1909. 

(c)  Conversion  of  St.  Paul.     Digby  MS.    Printed  sepa- 

rately ;  J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897. 

(d)  The  Conversion  of  Mary  Magdalene.    Digby  MS. 

Reprinted  in  part  by  Pollard,  Miracle  Plays. 
(c)  Lost  play  of  Kynge  Robart  of  Cicylye,  played  at  the  High 

Cross,  Chester,  1529.    Stated  to  have  been  previously 

shown,  in  Henry  VII's  reign.    Cf.  Collier,  i,  111-113. 

Play  on  same  subject  acted  at  Lincoln,  1453. 
(/)  Cornish  Miracle  Drama.  The  Life  of  St.  Meriasek, 

Bishop   and  Confessor.     Ed.  with  a  Translation  and 

Notes  by  Whitley  Stokes,  1872. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  EAHLY  MORALITY 

WE  have  seen  in  the  last  chapter  that  when  the  Tudof 
era  began,  and  for  a  long  time  after,  mystery  plays, 
more  or  less  seriously  spiritual  hi  tone,  were  being 
produced  periodically  at  York,  Chester,  Coventry, 
and  in  many  other  localities.  There  was,  to  be  sure, 
already  a  generous  infusion  hi  all  the  cycles  of  non- 
religious  matter,  and  the  connection  of  prelate  and 
players  was  growing  more  and  more  that  of  the  pro- 
verbial hen  and  goslings.  Still,  the  break  was  not 
open,  and  the  superficial  alliance  between  mystery 
play  and  established  religion  outlived  the  Reformation 
by  several  decades. 

Beside  the  mystery  there  had  grown  up,  precisely 
whence  or  how  no  man  can  say,  another  form  of  reli- 
gious drama:  the  morality  or  moral  play.  The  differ- 
ence in  the  relation  of  the  two  types  to  the  Church  is 
great  and  significant.  The  mystery  was  based  on  re- 
vealed religion :  it  had  to  do  with  flesh  and  blood  char- 
acters of  the  Old  and  New  Testament,  or  hi  the  case 
of  its  off-shoot,  the  miracle  play,  with  superhuman 
manifestations  equally  concrete,  and  for  the  belief  of 
the  time  equally  authentic.  The  concern  of  the  moral- 
ity was  with  metaphysical  theology,  with  abstract 
conceptions  of  good  and  evil,  —  with  Vices  and  Virtues 
of  paste-board.  Despite  the  existence  of  a  little  good 
work  in  a  sombre  and  rather  morbid  vein,  —  the  prob- 
ably foreign  "Everyman,"  for  example, —  the  strict 


48  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

morality  is  a  poor  and  thin  thing  altogether.  In  its  nat- 
ural state  it  was  constructed  from  the  cobwebs  of  the- 
oretical divinity,  and  it  was  inevitable  that  it  should 
seek,  even  more  than  the  sturdier  mystery,  to  cure 
the  anaemia  of  life  and  character  by  taking  to  itself 
increasingly  large  portions  of  vulgar  realism  and  bur- 
lesque. As  it  did  so,  it  became  both  more  robust  and 
coarser.  The  two  or  three  plots  that  belonged  to  the 
morality  repertoire  were  used  over  and  over,  with  a 
smaller  spiritual  bias  at  each  renovation,  till  finally 
their  secularization  was  complete,  and  they  remained 
merely  as  props  to  support  a  superstructure  of  un- 
mixed farce. 

The  debt  of  the  later  drama  to  the  mystery  consists 
in  the  cultivation  of  general  tastes  and  influences, 
rather  than  the  evolution  of  specific  models.  But  the 
early  moralities,  shapeless  for  the  most  part  and  arti- 
ficial as  they  are,  begin  a  tradition  in  English  comedy, 
which,  though  it  was  almost  buried  in  the  accretion  of 
new  elements,  was  not  interrupted  till  the  time  of  the 
Commonwealth  at  least.  Tragedy,  on  the  other  hand, 
was  early  crowded  out  of  the  morality;  and  the  prom- 
ise of  the  mystery  with  its  many  tragic  potentialities 
— the  promise  also  of  the  first  stern  moralities  —  came 
to  nought.  Hence  the  deplorable  weakness  of  the 
earliest  Elizabethan  tragedy  when  compared  with  the 
vital,  if  barbarous,  comedy  of  the  same  period  (1558- 
1585). 

The  morality  seems  to  be  first  mentioned  under  the 
titles  of  Paternoster  and  Creed  plays,1  and  in  this  form 

1  For  a  statement  of  the  relationship  between  such  plays  and  the 
formal  doctrine  of  the  heads  of  the  northern  church,  see  E.  N.  S. 
Thompson,  The  English  Moral  Plays,  335  ff. 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  49 

is  of  most  respectable  antiquity, — only  half  a  century 
younger  than  the  oldest  recorded  mysteries.  We  have 
Wyclif 's  word,  supported  by  several  later  references, 
for  the  existence  of  a  Paternoster  Play  "  in  Engliscsh 
tunge"  at  York  in  1378.  We  know  concerning  the  con- 
tents only  that  it  was  "  a  Play  setting  forth  the  good- 
ness of  the  Lord's  Prayer  —  in  which  play  all  manner 
of  vices  and  sins  were  held  up  to  scorn,  and  the  virtues 
were  held  up  to  praise."  A  Creed  Play,  enthusiastically 
described  as  "  ludus  incomparabilis,"  is  mentioned  in 
connection  with  the  same  play-loving  city  in  various 
years  between  1446  and  1568.  Lincoln  witnessed  a  lu- 
dus de  paternoster  in  1397-1398  and  on  a  number  of  later 
occasions.  At  Beverley,  a  city  of  lost  plays,  we  learn 
that  a  Paternoster  play  was  given  in  1469,  apparently 
on  an  ambitious  scale,  since  it  was  presented  pro- 
cessionally  in  eight  pageants  to  each  of  which  four  or 
more  guilds  were  made  contributory.  One  pageant  was 
assigned  to  each  of  the  seven  deadly  sins,  the  last  and 
most  elaborate  to  "Vicious,"  by  whom  Mr.  Chambers 
presumes  frail  humanity  (Everyman,  Mankind,  Genus 
Humanum)  to  be  typified.  Perhaps  this  spectacle  was, 
however,  as  much  in  the  nature  of  tableaux  as  drama; 
it  is  hard  to  imagine  how  anything  very  similar  to  a 
morality  play  could  be  acted  on  eight  separate  stages. 
Possibly  the  first  seven  pageants  represented  or  pic- 
tured the  triumph  of  seven  virtues  over  their  opposites, 
while  the  last  in  some  way  summarized  the  effects,  and 
gave  them  human  application. 

Since  no  example  of  these  early  works  has  been  pre- 
served, we  know  very  little  of  the  actual  form  which 
the  morality  took  at  its  inception.  The  occasion  of  its 
origin,  however,  is  not  far  to  seek.  The  morality  is  the 


50  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

last  expression  of  the  great  mediaeval  taste  for  alle- 
gory. The  mighty  convention,  which  we  can  trace 
from  its  various  beginnings  in  works  like  the  "Psycho- 
machia  "  of  the  fifth-century  Prudentius,  or  the  machin- 
ery of  the  courts  of  love,  to  its  ambitious  maturity  in 
the  "Romance  of  the  Rose,"  found  its  last  refuge  in 
the  religious  drama.  By  the  time  Chaucer  had  attained 
to  manhood,  the  new  realism  of  Italy  had  pretty  well 
driven  allegory  from  its  place  in  fashionable  literature, 
—  never  quite  to  regain  it  till  modernized  and  re- 
vitalized by  Spenser.  As  usual,  the  professed  writers 
of  didactics  inherited  the  form  and  standards  of  taste 
which  the  more  virile  profane  poets  had  outgrown.  To 
understand  the  allegorical  machinery  of  "The  Castle 
of  Perseverance,"  we  have  only  to  turn,  on  the  one 
hand,  to  the  siege  of  the  Castle  of  Danger  by  the  virtues 
in  the  "Romance  of  the  Rose,"  and,  on  the  other,  to 
the  great  symbolic  poems  of  "The  Owl  and  the  Night- 
ingale," and  the  "Debate  of  the  Body  and  the  Soul." 
But,  of  course,  it  is  a  case  of  contagion,  not  imitation : 
we  can  no  more  trace  the  morality  back  specifically 
to  Prudentius  or  any  single  passage  of  Scripture  than 
we  can  locate  the  final  source  of  a  mountain  torrent. 
The  earliest  morality  which  has  come  down  to  us 
dates  probably  from  the  beginning  of  the  fifteenth 
century.  It  is  a  fragment  preserved  in  an  Irish  manu- 
script, but  of  southern  English  composition,  and  has 
been  named  in  recent  times  "The  Pride  of  Life."  It 
treats  the  old  theme  of  the  coming  of  death,  —  a  theme 
by  which  the  mediaeval  mind  was  peculiarly  affected, 
and  which  offered  either  the  starting  point  or  the 
dramatic  climax  of  nearly  all  the  oldest  moralities. 
"The  Pride  of  Life"  distinguishes  itself  noticeably 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  51 

from  the  other  members  of  the  species  by  its  verging 
toward  the  concrete.  Instead  of  a  single  type  of  hu- 
manity thronged  about  by  vices  and  virtues,  as  in 
"The  Castle  of  Perseverance,"  we  find  here  three  dis- 
tinct individuals :  a  king,  his  queen,  and  a  bishop,  — 
all  class  types,  to  be  sure,  but  not  thoroughly  symbolic, 
and  not  without  personal  touches.  The  play,  which  is 
written  in  quatrains,  riming  alternately,  begins  with 
a  conventional  exhortation  to  the  out-of-door  audience 
to  keep  peace  and  listen  in  spite  of  the  weather.  The 
manuscript  breaks  off  before  the  catastrophe.  The  story 
concerns  the  opposition  between  the  inevitable  Death 
and  the  moral  hero  of  the  piece,  "Rex  Vivus,"  — 
a  type  of  arrogant  and  comfortable  feudalism  much 
like  the  speaker  in  the  "Dux  Moraud"  fragment. 
The  contrast  is  brought  out  with  considerable  power, 
and  several  of  the  characters  possess  elements  of  life. 
The  nuntius,  or  messenger,  Mirth  by  name,  foreshad- 
ows dimly  the  Vice  of  the  later  morality  and  the  Eliza- 
bethan clown,  though  the  comic  side  of  his  character 
is  rather  latent  than  expressed. 

From  this  fragment,  richer  in  promise  than  in  actual 
fulfilment,  we  may  turn  to  what  is  probably  the  earliest 
complete  morality  extant.1  "The  Castle  of  Persever- 
ance," preserved  with  two  other  notable  moralities  in 
the  famous  Macro  manuscript,  is  a  truly  formidable 
work  of  over  thirty-six  hundred  lines,  dating  in  its 
editor's  opinion  from  about  1425;  written  in  complex 
metrical  forms,  and  adorned  with  all  the  musty  alle- 
gorical ornament  which  the  "  Romance  of  the  Rose" 
had  familiarized.  Yet  it  has  indubitable  dignity.  Po- 
etically and  structurally,  it  is  a  creditable  produc- 
1  An  inconsiderable  portion  of  this  play  is  also  lust. 


62  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tion,  and  it  is  well  worth  careful  study  because  of  its 
richness  of  suggestion  for  the  later  drama.  The  plot 
is  developed  with  a  breadth  of  scope  and  massive  ful- 
ness of  detail,  which  inspire  the  reader's  respect,  even 
while  they  weary  him.  The  story  is  the  career  of 
Man  (Humanum  Genus)  from  birth  to  final  judgment. 
The  infant,  approached  by  an  evil  and  a  good  angel, 
accepts  the  counsel  of  the  former,  who  leads  him 
to  Mundus,  the  World.  From  Mundus  he  is  sent  to 
Covetousness,  where  he  falls  in  with  all  the  deadly  sins. 
The  Good  Angel,  however,  with  the  aid  of  Shrift,  ulti- 
mately secures  his  repentance,  and  lodges  him  for  safety 
in  the  Castle  of  Perseverance,  with  the  seven  virtues 
for  garrison.  The  powers  of  evil  —  the  World,  the 
Flesh,  and  the  Devil  —  summon  all  their  forces  to  a 
general  assault,  in  which  each  vice  is  overthrown  by  its 
opposing  virtue.  Covetousness,  however,  succeeds  in 
enticing  Man  from  the  castle  into  the  world,  where  he 
falls  again  into  sin  and  is  at  last  overthrown  by  Death. 
Man's  soul  appeals  to  the  Good  Angel,  who  directs  it 
to  Mercy.  The  cause  is  tried  before  the  "Pater  sedens 
in  throno,"  who  decides,  after  a  debate,  in  favor  of 
the  benignant  virtues  of  Mercy  and  Peace,  as  against 
Justice  and  Truth,  the  accusers. 

It  has  been  said  that  no  direct  relation  can  be  estab- 
lished on  the  side  of  tragedy  between  the  religious  play 
and  the  Elizabethan  secular  drama.  Sporadic  evi- 
dences of  kinship  do  occur,  as  in  the  analogy  between 
the  convention  of  the  good  and  evil  angels,  who  appear 
from  time  to  time  in  the  play  we  are  discussing,  and  the 
very  similar  figures  in  Marlowe's  "Doctor  Faustus."  x 

1  The  Good  Angel  interposes  in  a  very  similar  manner  in  The 
Conflict  of  Conscience  (cf.  p.  000),  and  was  doubtless  a  perfectly 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  63 

Here,  however,  Marlowe  has  deliberately  gone  back, 
as  he  did  in  borrowing  the  masque  of  the  seven 
deadly  sins,  to  an  archaic  form  of  drama  for  the  par- 
ticular purposes  of  one  play. 

It  was  on  the  side  of  comedy  that  the  influence  of  the 
moral  play  made  itself  permanently  felt.  Some  of  the 
figures  in  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance  "  contain  the 
germs  of  a  species  of  farce,  which  was  later  to  run  a 
most  illustrious  career.  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance" 
is,  of  course,  an  essentially  serious  work,  but  it  is  not 
purely  serious,  like  "Everyman."  It  has  much  greater 
complexity  of  structure  than  the  latter  play.  Death 
and  his  horrors  are  not  always  in  our  immediate  pres- 
ence. On  the  contrary,  the  World,  the  Flesh,  and  the 
Devil,  with  their  companion  sins,  occupy  very  ini]x>r- 
tant  positions  during  the  greater  part  of  the  drama,  and 
they  all  have  their  amusing  side.  In  the  speeches  of 
the  different  vices  to  Mankind  (11.  1048  ff)  we  find 
much  of  that  serio-comic  use  of  the  petty  details  of 
dress  and  demeanor,  which  appears  so  abundantly  in 
Chaucer  and  "Piers  the  Plowman, "and  which  becomes 
purely  comic  in  the  work  of  Ben  Jonson.  In  the  lamen- 
tations of  the  vices  over  the  wounds  received  in  con- 
flict with  the  virtues,  and  in  the  physical  chastisement 
administered  by  the  World,  the  Flesh,  and  the  Devil 
to  their  subordinates  for  allowing  Mankind  to  escape, 
as  well  as  in  the  preparations  for  war  and  boastful 
speeches  of  the  besiegers  of  the  castle,  there  lay  matter 
for  mirth  which  might  be  expanded  and  emphasized 

familiar  stock  figure.  A  study  of  the  special  relationship  of  Doctor 
Fanshia  to  the  English  moral  play  is  promised  by  E.  N.  S.  Thompson. 
See  Proceedings  of  the  Modern  Language  Association  of  America, 
Central  Division,  1010. 


54  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

almost  ad  libitum.  And  the  stage  directions  show  that 
the  actors  were  by  no  means  neglectful  of  these  oppor- 
tunities. The  character  of  Backbiter,  or  Detractio, 
alias  Flypyrgebet,  is  a  most  notable  development  of 
the  comic  possibilities  latent  in  the  " nuntius "  of  "The 
Pride  of  Life."  In  his  purely  comic  function  and  his 
equal  alacrity  to  plague  vice  or  virtue,  Backbiter 
shows  himself  a  true  prototype  of  the  later  Iniquity. 
The  directions  for  the  staging  of  "The  Castle  of  Per- 
severance" are  unusually  full,  and  they  merit  especial 
attention,  because  they  show  certain  characteristic 
features  of  the  Elizabethan  theatre  already  well  inau- 
gurated. At  the  end  of  the  manuscript  is  an  interesting 
sketch  of  the  stage,  with  directions  for  acting.  From 
this  drawing  and  from  the  three  less  complex  ones  con- 
tained in  the  manuscript  of  the  Cornish  mystery  cycle, 
eked  out  by  the  generous  stage  directions  of  the  present 
play,  "Mary  Magdalene,"  and  several  others,  it  is 
possible  to  construct  a  very  definite  image  of  the  type 
of  stage  used  by  the  early  morality  players  and  the  per- 
formers of  the  non-processional  mysteries.  Something 
has  been  already  said  on  this  subject,  by  way  of  anti- 
cipation, in  discussing  the  play  of  "  Mary  Magdalene," 
which  is  perhaps  half  a  century  younger  than  the  mo- 
rality now  before  us. l  "  The  Castle  of  Perseverance ' '  was 
played  out  of  doors,  on  a  green.  The  stage  was  circular, 
after  the  manner  of  the  Cornish  open-air  theatres,  and 
surrounded  by  water,  "  if  any  dyche  may  be  mad,  ther 
[i.  e.,  where]  it  schal  be  pleyed."  Otherwise,  it  was 
to  be  strongly  barred  all  about,  —  evidently  to  keep 
the  spectators  from  encroaching.  Elizabethan  laxity  of 
discrimination  between  actor  and  spectator  is  suggested 
1  Cf.  p.  33. 


C  S" 

X  O 

E  '•$ 

3  p 


u;    si  r 
^    p    a 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  65 

by  the  direction:  "let  not  over  many  stytelerys  [i.  e., 
stage-managers]  be  within  the  place,"  and  the  prohibi- 
tion that  no  men  are  to  sit  on  the  castle  wall  lest  they 
obstruct  the  view  of  the  rest, "  for  ther  schal  be  the  best 
[seat]  of  all." 

The  castle  itself  occupies  the  centre  of  the  stage.  It  is 
built  upon  posts  or  blocks  in  such  a  way  that  the  lower 
part  is  hollow  and  affords  room  for  Mankind's  bed, 
under  which,  in  the  absence  of  curtains,  the  soul 
(Anima)  has  to  lie  concealed  through  three  thousand 
and  eight  dreary  lines,  "tyl  he  schal  ryse  &  pleye." 
Around  the  circumference  of  the  stage,  which,  of 
course,  would  have  spectators  on  all  sides,  are  the  five 
scaffolds  or  seats  of  the  World,  the  Flesh,  and  the  Devil 
(Caro,  Mundus,  Belyal),  Covetousness,  and  God.  The 
last,  occupied  by  the  "  Pater  sedens  in  throno  "  and  the 
Virtues,  seems  to  have  been  used  only  for  the  post- 
mortem part  of  the  play,  except  that  the  Good  Angel 
doubtless  retired  thither  after  his  various  ministrations 
to  Mankind.  During  the  wrhole  of  Mankind's  life,  the 
occupants  of  this  scaffold  would  sit  as  impassive  and 
ostensibly  invisible  spectators  of  all  the  business  trans- 
acted on  the  other  four  scaffolds,  in  the  castle,  and  the 
"platea,"  or  unappropriated  space  between. 

There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  a  continuous 
stage  tradition  subsisted  and  was  passed  on  from  one 
generation  to  another  from  the  time  when,  in  this  play 
of  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance,"  it  first  comes  defi- 
nitely before  our  eyes,  till  the  end  of  the  pre-Restoration 
epoch.  It  will  be  instructive,  therefore,  to  look  with 
some  attention  at  certain  features  in  the  manner  of 
presentation  of  the  work  before  us.  Prefixed  to  the 
play,  but  really  forming  no  essential  part  of  it,  is  an 


56  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

interesting  prologue  spoken  by  two  vexillatores.  It  is 
the  mediaeval  substitute  for  the  modern  posters  which 
announce  the  coming  of  a  theatrical  troupe.  After 
ten  long  stanzas,  recited  alternately,  in  which  the  argu- 
ment of  the  intended  play  is  given,  the  second  vexil- 
lator  makes  the  following  announcement :  — 

"These  parcellis  in  propyrtes  we  purpose  us  to  playe 
This  day  seuenenyt,  be-fore  you  in  syth  [sight], 
At  —  on  the  grene,  in  ryall  a-ray. 

Ye  haste  you  thanne  thedyrward,  syris,  hendly  in  hy th. 
All  goode  neyboris,  ful  specyaly  we  you  pray, 
&  loke  that  ye  be  there  be-tyme,  luffly  &  lyth, 
for  we  schul  be  onward  be  vnderne  of  the  day." 

The  first  vexillator  then  takes  leave  in  the  following 
words :  — 

"Ye  manly  men  of  —  thus  Crist  saue  you  all! 
he  maynten  youre  myrthis,  &  kepe  you  fro  greve, 
that  born  was  of  Mary  mild  in  an  ox  stall. 
Now,  mercy  be  all  — ,  &  wel  mote  ye  cheve." 

In  the  passages  just  quoted  three  blanks  occur. 
The  first,  in  the  speech  of  "Secundus  Vexillator," 
must  obviously  have  been  supplied  by  the  name  of  the 
town  where  the  performance  was  to  take  place,  while 
the  other  two  require  rather  the  name  of  the  place 
of  proclamation.  Evidently,  the  vexillatores  were  dis- 
patched a  week  before  each  exhibition  through  all  the 
hamlets  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  selected  village  to 
summon  an  audience.  Except  for  the  changes  wrought 
by  the  invention  of  printing  and  the  present  lament- 
able cheapness  of  paper  and  colored  ink,  the  advertise- 
ment of  a  circus  or  fair  in  an  agricultural  community 
is  now  conducted  in  a  surprisingly  similar  manner. 
It  has  been  noted  that  a  very  similar  announcement  is 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  57 

prefixed  to  the  so-called  "Ludus  Coventrise"  which 
came  to  be  acted,  though  not  originally  so  destined, 
under  circumstances  probably  identical  with  those  we 
are  discussing. 

It  is  of  no  little  importance  for  the  development  of 
dramatic  art  in  England  that  "The  Castle  of  Perse- 
verance "  was  performed,  as  this  prologue  tells  us,  not 
like  the  great  mystery  cycles,  in  one  particular  place 
by  resident  members  of  various  guilds,  or  by  resident 
clerics,  but  by  more  or  less  professional  actors  in  the 
way  of  business,  before  a  number  of  villages  in  turn. 
This  seems  to  me  the  beginning  of  theatrical  companies 
in  England.  The  manuscript  informs  us  that  there  were 
thirty-six  "ludares,"  and  thirty-five  speaking  parts  can 
be  actually  counted.  Under  the  conditions  of  presenta- 
tion it  is  not  easy  to  conceive  much  doubling  of  r61es; 
and  yet,  if  the  company  was  really  itinerant,  it  would 
probably  have  to  be  much  smaller  than  this  to  ensure 
a  satisfactory  relation  between  expenses  and  receipts. 
It  seems  most  likely  that  the  strollers  comprised  only  a 
nucleus  of  the  company  and  that  they  drafted  local 
amateurs  for  the  minor  parts  in  each  place  in  which 
they  acted,  —  a  practice  still  adhered  to  in  certain 
spectacular  productions  which  require  a  great  number 
of  figures.  This  theory  receives  some  support  from 
Richard  Carew's  account  of  the  manner  in  which  the 
Cornish  mysteries  were  presented  in  the  sixteenth 
century:  "The  players  conne  not  their  parts  without 
booke,  but  are  prompted  by  one  called  the  Ordinary, 
who  followeth  at  their  back  with  the  booke  in  his  hand, 
and  telleth  them  softly  what  they  must  pronounce 
aloud."  And  he  adds  a  story  of  a  practical  joke  played 
on  the  Ordinary  by  a  volunteer  actor. 


58  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

The  later  moralities  were  usually  performed  by  com- 
panies of  four  or  five  men  and  a  boy, — the  boy,  of  course, 
taking  women's  parts.  These  troupes,  once  formed, 
continued  themselves  in  unbroken  sequence  till  the 
Restoration.  There  seems  no  doubt  that  the  strolling 
players  of  the  Commonwealth  who  roamed  from  vil- 
lage to  village  with  their  contraband  dramatic  wares, 
after  the  suppression  of  the  theatres  in  1642,  were  the 
lineal  descendants,  and  the  inheritors  of  many  a  piece 
of  traditional  clownage  and  stage  business  from  those 
who  in  pre-Tudor  times  performed  "The  Castle  of 
Perseverance."  The  tradition  thus  established  was  one 
of  comedy  solely,  as  I  have  hinted.  The  tragic  matter 
in  the  early  moralities  —  the  sometimes  really  affect- 
ing sense  of  the  frailty  of  mortal  man  and  the  constant 
approach  of  temptation — was  all  gradually  supplanted. 
The  strollers  followed  the  line  of  least  resistance  and 
greatest  popularity,  giving  their  rustic  audiences  what 
the  latter  best  liked  and  what  the  actors  might  most 
readily  improvise.  Therefore,  we  find  in  the  early  days 
of  Elizabeth  a  comic  tradition  so  firmly  rooted  that 
tragedy  might  not  stand  against  it.  The  old  gags  and 
witticisms  of  morality  players  force  themselves  not 
only  into  weak  and  colorless  tragedies  such  as  "Damon 
and  Pythias,"  "Cambyses,"or  "  Appiusand  Virginia"; 
they  find  unwelcome  admittance,  as  it  were  in  the 
teeth  of  Marlowe's  defiance,  into  "Doctor  Faustus' 
and  "Tamburlaine." 

In  the  palmy  days  of  Elizabethan  drama  the  great 
companies,  under  the  patronage  of  royalty  or  nobility, 
and  under  the  direction  of  such  men  as  Shakespeare, 
Burbage,  and  Alleyn,  grew  far  beyond  the  slender 
promise  of  the  troupes  that  acted  "The  Castle  of  Per- 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  59 

severance."  But  the  difference  is  one  of  scale  rather 
than  kind.  And  there  existed  throughout  the  period  of 
the  great  drama  and  great  stage-managers  a  humbler 
sort  of  players,  itinerant  for  the  most  part,  and 
hounded  unmercifully  by  the  law,  who  seem  to  have 
represented  a  very  slight  advance  in  dramatic  art 
over  the  actors  of  moralities.  Throughout  the  Eliza- 
bethan age,  plays  appear  to  have  been  published  for  the 
express  use  of  these  strolling  companies, — plays  de- 
manding simple  stage  properties  and  a  modest  num- 
ber of  actors.  Thus,  to  specify  one  out  of  innumerable 
instances  from  the  earlier  period,  the  title-page  of  the 
transitional  morality  of  "Horestes,"  published  1567, 
suggests  a  division  of  parts  by  which  twenty-five  roles 
can  be  filled  by  six  actors :  while  in  the  play  of  "  Muce- 
dorus"  a  full  generation  later  the  parts  are  similarly  ap- 
portioned among  eight  players.  So,  too,  the  ineffably 
silly  text  of  Marlowe's  "Doctor  Faustus,"  printed  in 
1663,  marred  equally  by  timid  excisions  of  passages 
touching  on  religion  and  by  the  addition  of  much 
puerile  buffoonery,  bears  on  its  face  the  proof  of  hav- 
ing been  prepared  for  illegitimate  acting  during  the 
period  of  Puritan  ascendancy. 

TTis  a  mistake  to  suppose,  as  is  often  done,  that  the 
early  morality  stands  on  a  higher  plane  in  the  matter 
of  plot  construction  than  the  mystery.  Theoretically, 
doubtless,  it  should  have  done  so;  the  greater  freedom 
of  the  morality  from  actual  fact,  the  removal  of  the 
necessity  under  which  the  mystery  stood  of  presenting 
specific  Biblical  incidents  and  characters  in  a  particular 
sequence,  ought  perhaps  to  have  made  the  plots  of  the 
moralities  more  flexible  and  various,  —  though  the 
essential  incompatibility  in  the  drama  of  fact  and  fie- 


60  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tion  is  rather  an  assumption  than  a  certainty.  Ulti- 
mately, to  be  sure,  the  mystery  was  out-distanced,  but 
only  after  the  morality  proper  had  been  supplanted 
by  the  "topical"  and  largely  comic  interlude.  The 
primitive  morality  of  the  type  of  "The  Castle  of  Per- 
severance" and  "Everyman"  is  characterized  by  no- 
thing more  than  by  its  lack  of  ingenuity  in  the  inven- 
tion of  plots.  Only  three  are  to  be  found  among  the 
extant  specimens  of  the  strict  morality.  They  were  for 
the  greater  part  borrowed  from  the  fashionable  litera- 
ture of  the  previous  age,  and  the  later  moralities 
cribbed  even  more  unblushingly  from  their  predeces- 
sors. Plot  and  situation  were  handed  on  from  one  play 
to  another  with  little  other  adaptation  than  resulted 
from  the  not  invariable  change  of  name  of  the  charac- 
ters and  the  constantly  increasing  demand  for  comedy. 
The  three  distinguishable  plots  have  been  called  the 
Coming  of  Death,  the  Conflict  of  Vices  and  Virtues, 
and  the  Debate  of  the  Heavenly  Virtues.  The  second 
is  both  greatly  the  most  popular  with  morality  writers 
themselves  and  the  only  one  which  contributed  any- 
thing of  much  consequence  to  later  drama.1 

"The  Castle  of  Perseverance,"  the  most  comprehen- 
sive morality  extant,  contains  and  blends  with  con- 
siderable skill  all  these  three  plots.  In  it,  therefore,  is 
to  be  found  the  entire  structural  stock  in  trade  of  its 
type.  The  first  part  of  the  play  culminates  in  the  con- 
flict of  the  virtues  and  vices  for  possession  of  Mankind 
and  the  castle  in  which  he  has  taken  refuge, — a  plot 
derived,  as  has  been  pointed  out,  from  the  older  secular 

1  A  valuable  discussion  of  the  various  types  of  morality  plots  is 
contained  in  the  introduction  to  R.  L.  Ramsay's  edition  of  Skelton's 
Magnificence,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1908. 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  61 

allegory.  The  second  part  of  the  play  presents  the  dra- 
matic crisis  in  the  coming  of  Death,  and  then,  as  the 
author  is  unwilling  to  accept  a  tragic  conclusion,  he 
appends  (from  line  3030  on)  the  debate  of  the  heavenly 
virtues  over  Mankind's  soul,  and  the  final  triumph  of 
the  powers  of  compassion. 

The  huge  scope  of  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance"  is 
thus  evident.  The  single  incident  of  the  arrival  of 
death,  derived  probably  from  the  popular  mediaeval 
representations  of  the  Dance  of  Death,  forms  the  sub- 
ject of  "Everyman"  and  of  the  existing  portion  of 
"The  Pride  of  Life."  The  only  other  example  of  the 
"Debate"  plot  —  a  belated  off-shoot  of  the  dcbat  so 
common  and  so  successfully  exemplified  in  early 
French  and  early  English  secular  poetry  —  is  to  be 
found  interpolated  into  the  " Ludus  Coventrise"  mys- 
tery cycle.  The  history  of  the  morality  is  really  the 
history  of  the  conflict-plot.  It  was  this  which  offered 
the  greatest  amount  of  human  interest,  the  greatest  op- 
portunity for  differentiation  of  character,  and  infinitely 
the  largest  scope  for  comedy.  All  the  humorous  ele- 
ments previously  pointed  out  in  "The  Castle  of  Perse- 
verance" arise  directly  from  the  conflict  of  vice  and 
virtue. 

The  late  fifteenth-century  Macro  manuscript,  in 
which  '*  The  Castle  of  Perseverance  "  is  preserved,  con- 
tains two  other  moralities.  Next  in  age  and  in  length  to 
that  which  we  have  been  discussing,  and  decidedly  the 
least  interesting  of  the  three,  is  the  dainty,  but  cer- 
tainly not  forceful  play  of  "  Mind,  Will,  and  Under- 
standing," otherwise  known  as  "Wisdom."  The  plot 
of  this  work  is  as  much  distinguished  by  its  slenderness 
as  is  that  of  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance"  by  its  full- 


62  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

ness.  The  difference  in  content  and  intensity  between 
these  two  pieces,  separated  in  date  of  composition  by 
possibly  a  generation,  is  most  remarkable.  In  "Mind, 
Will,  and  Understanding"  nothing  whatever  of  any 
permanent  consequence  takes  place,  but  the  spectacu- 
lar effects  are  much  the  most  elaborate  to  be  found  in 
any  of  the  moralities.  The  piece  is  indeed  more  masque 
or  ballet  than  drama.  There  are  few  indications  of  the 
mode  of  presentation;  but  it  is  noticeable  that  we  have 
to  do  here  with  a  stage  on  which  the  actors  can  appear 
and  disappear,  and  that  from  a  total  of  at  least  thirty- 
nine  persons  only  six  have  speaking  parts.  These  six 
may  represent  the  five  men  and  a  boy  of  a  travelling 
company,  the  ballet  dancers  being  impressed  each  time 
from  among  the  natives;  but  the  character  of  the  play 
does  not  suggest  professional  or  even  secular  perform- 
ance. It  seems  to  me  much  more  likely  to  be  a  school 
production,  where  the  dancers  would,  of  course,  be 
carefully  trained  scholars  or  choristers,  and  where  the 
five  chief  male  parts  would  be  taken  either  by  the  mas- 
ters or  by  advanced  pupils.  It  is  to  be  noted  that  the 
piece  is  thoroughly  orthodox  throughout.  There  is  a 
vast  amount  of  good  and  somewhat  tedious  doctrine 
at  the  beginning  and  end,  while  the  intermediate  hu- 
morous portion,  though  to  modern  notions  somewhat 
plain-spoken,  is  all  put  into  the  mouth  of  evil  or  cor- 
rupted characters  and  so  accords  perfectly  with  medi- 
seval  proprieties. 

The  play  is  introduced  by  a  long  dialogue  between 
Wisdom,  or  Christ,  and  the  Soul.  The  Soul,  subject  to 
the  two  conflicting  forces  of  sensuality  and  reason,  is 
instructed  to  cleave  to  the  latter,  and  for  her  guidance 
is  presented  with  the  five  wits,  —  mutce  persona;  dressed 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  63 

as  virgins,  and  three  "mights,"  Mind,  Will,  and  Under- 
standing. The  good  figures  go  out  with  operatic  dance 
and  song,  leaving  the  stage  to  Lucifer,  who  appears 
"in  a  devil's  array"  to  exclaim  "Owt  harow,  I  rore," 
and  inform  the  audience  of  his  malign  intentions.  He 
then  departs,  to  reappear  in  the  dress  of  a  gallant  and 
seduce  Mind,  Will,  and  Understanding,  who  have  in  the 
meanwhile  returned.  The  "  mights,"  easily  corrupted 
to  their  respective  sins  of  Ambition,  Lust,  and  Avarice, 
entertain  each  other  with  spicy  accounts  of  their  for- 
bidden pleasures,  till  Wisdom  enters  with  admonitions 
and  points  out  the  change  their  defection  has  made  in 
Soul,  who  comes  forward  "in  the  most  horrybull  wyse, 
fowlere  than  a  fende,"  with  six  small  boys  in  the  like- 
ness of  devils  running  out  from  her  mantle.  At  this 
spectacle  the  "mights"  repent,  whereupon  the  devils 
disappear,  and  the  piece  closes  with  a  homily. 

The  outstanding  fact  in  the  later  history  of  the  mo- 
rality is  its  decadence  as  an  exponent  of  serious  ideals. 
Already  in  the  third  of  the  Macro  plays,  "Mankind," 
a  work  dating  probably,  like  the  manuscript  which 
contains  it,  from  the  last  quarter  of  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury, we  find  the  whole  moral  machinery  diverted  to 
the  production  of  buffoonery.  Both  in  scope  and  in 
seriousness  a  great  falling  off  is  evident.  This  play  runs 
to  barely  nine  hundred  lines  instead  of  the  thirty-eight 
hundred,  approximately,  of  the  complete  "Castle  of 
Perseverance";  and  the  reduction  in  comprehensive- 
ness is  equally  radical.  Like  the  latter  drama,  "Man- 
kind "  is  clearly  intended  for  professional  and  nomadic 
performance.  We  can  even  trace  roughly  the  tour  of 
the  company  through  Cambridgeshire  and  Norfolk  by 
the  numerous  local  allusions.  Many  changes  and  de- 


64  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

velopments,  however,  can  be  noticed.  The  fixed  out-of- 
door  stage  of  the  first  Macro  play  has  been  supplanted, 
apparently,  by  the  inn-yard,  itself  in  turn  the  progeni- 
tor of  the  Elizabethan  popular  theatre.  Actors  go  on 
and  off  the  stage  in  the  modern  manner,  and  the  box- 
office  side  of  the  business  attains  a  prominence  entirely 
novel.  Half  through  the  piece,  the  great  master  demon, 
Tutivillus,  who  has  not  yet  appeared,  is  heard  to  shout 
from  behind  the  scenes:  "I  com  with  my  leggis  vndur 
me,"  and  the  actors  grasp  the  psychological  moment  of 
suspense  to  levy  contribution:  — 

"Now  gostly  to  owur  purpos,  worschypfull  souerence! 
We  intende  to  gather  mony,  yf  yt  plese  yower  neclygence. 
For  a  man  with  a  hede  that  is  of  gret  omnipotena." 

The  spectators  are  further  assured  that  the  great  Tuti- 
villus 

"louyth  no  grotis  [groats],  nor  pens  or  to-pens: 
Gyf  vs  rede  reyallys,  yf  ye  wyll  se  hys  abhomynabull  presens." 

And  the  collection  begins  "At  the  goodeman  of  this 
house,"  i.  e.,  the  inn-keeper.  The  change  in  the  scene  of 
action  seems  to  have  carried  with  it  a  change  of  season. 
The  performances  on  the  green  could  have  occurred 
only  in  warm  weather,  but  "Mankind"  is  a  winter 
play,  full  of  references  to  fires  and  cold.  The  reason  for 
the  shift  is  doubtless  that  which  accounts  in  general  for 
the  great  permanence  of  popular  customs  connected 
with  Hallowe'en,  Christmas,  and  other  festivals  of 
cool  weather;  namely,  the  fact  that  winter  is  in  rural 
communities  the  season  of  leisure.  It  may  be,  too,  that 
the  strolling  professionals  found  their  poor  efforts 
eclipsed  in  summer  by  the  great  spectacles  of  Corpus 
Christi  and  the  like. 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  65 

The  numerous  characters  of  "The  Castle  of  Perse- 
verance "are  reduced  in  "Mankind"  to  seven,  three  of 
which  seem  to  be  boys'  parts,  while  the  four  men  might 
be  decreased  to  three  by  doubling  the  r61es  of  Mischief 
and  Tutivillus.  It  is  significant  that,  of  these  seven 
figures,  five  are  purely  comic :  the  mam  vices,  Tutivillus 
and  Mischief,  and  the  smaller  fry,  New  Guise,  Nought, 
and  Nowadays.  The  original  conception  of  the  moral- 
ity is  upheld  only  by  the  generalization  Mankind  and 
the  single  virtue  Mercy;  nor  do  these  two  remain  seri- 
ous throughout  the  play.  They  also  are  pressed  into 
service  in  the  author's  attempt  to  satisfy  the  ever- 
growing thirst  for  comic  situations.  We  are  perhaps 
not  obliged  to  follow  Mr.  Pollard l  in  assuming  that  the 
writer  has  consciously  burlesqued  the  figure  of  Mercy. 
The  comedy  is  probably  as  little  intentional  as  that  oc- 
casioned by  the  impossible  heroics  of  the  good  people 
in  a  schoolboy  melodrama.  Still  the  humorous  effect 
is  unquestionable,  and  it  shows  how  thoroughly  alien  to 
the  spirit  of  this  type  of  drama  had  become  the  moral 
didacticism  from  which  it  sprang. 

"Mankind"  has  as  nearly  as  possible  no  plot;  it 
touches  no  special  part  of  the  life  of  man,  and  it  illus- 
trates no  truth  of  character  or  religion.  Its  comedy 
is  perfectly  devoid  of  intellectual  interest,  consisting 
either  of  physical  horse-play  or  such  plebeian  obsceni- 
ties as  only  archaism  can  render  tolerable.  It  doubt- 
less represents  very  adequately  the  range  of  mental 
activity  among  the  fifteenth-century  rustics  for  whom 
it  was  written.  It  certainly  manifests  a  most  striking 
and  melancholy  kinship  to  the  species  of  wit  in  vogue 
among  the  same  public  to-day,  though  now  fortunately 
1  The  Macro  Plays,  E.  E.  T.  S. 


66  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

restricted  to  oral  circulation.  After  "Mankind,"  the 
type  of  drama  composed  for  village  presentation  runs 
a  subterranean  course.  Indications  of  its  continued 
existence  abound,  but  we  meet  with  no  more  examples 
of  it  till  the  Puritan  revolution,  sweeping  away  with 
the  theatres  all  the  more  refined  drama,  brings  to 
light  again  the  rude  amusements  of  the  yokels. 

The  three  plays  of  the  Macro  manuscript,  the  earli- 
est complete  moralities  extant,  probably  define  very 
comprehensively  the  limits  of  this  type  of  drama  when 
Henry  VII  ascended  the  English  throne.  It  is  not  to  be 
supposed  that  the  three  varieties  are  at  all  incompati- 
ble. There  was  doubtless  a  public  for  each :  one  class  of 
society  would  continue  to  support  the  elder  and  stricter 
form  after  another  class  had  demanded  and  received 
such  debased  modifications  as  "  Mankind."  The  famous 
play  of  "Everyman,"  dating  from  about  the  commence- 
ment of  the  sixteenth  century,  would  be  conclusive 
proof  of  the  sustained  interest  in  the  earliest  type  of 
morality  if  we  could  establish  its  English  origin.  All 
indications  seem,  however,  to  pronounce  in  favor  of  the 
Dutch  composition  of  this  piece, — not  least  perhaps  the 
fact  that  "Everyman"  stands  quite  outside  the  tangle 
of  indebtedness  and  influence  which  connects  nearly  all 
the  nativeEnglish  moral  plays,and  can  be  proved  neither 
to  have  borrowed  directly  from  its  predecessors  nor  to 
have  furnished  an  important  hint  to  any  of  its  successors. 

During  the  Tudor  period  the  morality  gained  a  po- 
sition in  fashionable  literature,  and  underwent  in  con- 
sequence a  special  development,  which  dissociated  it 
equally  from  the  interests  of  religious  teaching  and  of 
bourgeois  amusement,  and  rendered  it  ultimately  the 
principal  source  of  the  Elizabethan  drama. 


THE  EARLY  MORALITY  67 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 
GENERAL  DISCUSSION 

Cushman,  L.  W. :  The  Devil  and  the  Vice  in  English  Dramatic 

Literature  before  Shakespeare.    Halle,  1900. 
Eckhardt,  E.  :  Die  Lustige  Person  im  alteren  englischen  Drama 

(bit  164X).    Palaestra,  xvit.    Berlin,  1902. 
Thompson,  E.  N.  8.:  The  English  Moral  Plays;  "Transactions 

of  the  Connecticut  Academy  of  Arts  and  Sciences,"  1910. 
Traver,  H. :  The  Four  Daughters  of  God.    u  Bryn  Mawr  College 

Monographs,"  1907. 

TEXTS  AND  COMMENTARY 

The  Pride  of  Life.  MS.  Dublin.  Printed,  J.  Mills,  Proceed- 
ings Royal  Society  of  Antiquaries  of  Ireland,  1891;  A.  Brandl, 
Quellen,  1898;  F.  Holthausen,  Herrig's  Archiv,  108(1902), 
32-69  (improved  text);  O.  Waterhouse,  Non-Cycle  Mystery 
Plays,  etc.,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1909. 

Macro  Plays.    Preserved   in   "Macro"  MS.    Printed,  F.  J. 
Furnivall  and  A.  W.  Pollard,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1904. 
The  Castle  of  Perseverance.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908. 

Reprinted  in  part,  Pollard,  Miracle  Plays. 
Mind,  Will,  and  Understanding  (  \Visdom).  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1907.  Printed  separately,  Abbotsford  Club,  1837, 
W.  B.  D.  D.  Turnbull.  Printed  from  imperfect  MS.  among 
the  Digby  Plays,  Abbotsford  Club,  1835  (50  copies),  T. 
Sharp;  F.  J.  Furnivall,  Digby  Plays,  New  Shakspere  So- 
ciety, 1882  (reissued  for  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1896).—  Discussion: 
K.  Schmidt,  "  Die  Digby-Spiele,"  Berlin,  1884  ;  continued 
in  Anglia,  viii  (1885),  371  S. 

Mankind.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1907.   Printed  separately: 

J.T  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897;  A.  Brandl,  Quellen,  1898  ; 

J.  S.  Farmer,  "  Lost "  Tudor  Plays,  etc.,  1907. 

Everyman.   Translated  from  the  Dutch  Elckerlijk.    Four  early 

editions.    Reprinted :  T.  Hawkins,  Origin,  i,  1773  ;  K.  Goedeke, 

1865  ;  Hazlitt's  Dodsley,  i,  1874  ;  H.  Logemau  (with  Dutch 


68  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

version),  1892  ;  T.  Sidgwick,  1902  ;  A.  W.  Pollard,  15th  Cen- 
tury Prose  and  Verse,  1903  ;  M.  U.  Moses,  1903  ;  W.  W.  Greg, 
Materialien,  iv,  1904;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Anon.  Plays  (1st  Series), 
1905  ;  Select  English  Classics,  Oxford,  1909  ;  Everyman  and 
other  Interludes,  1909.  —  Discussion  :  K.  Goedeke,  "  Every- 
man, Homulus  and  Ilekastns,"  Hanover,  1865  ;  K.  H.  de  Raaf, 
"  Spyeghel  der  Selicheyt  van  Elckerlijk,"  1897;  H.  Logeman, 
"  Elckerlijk  —  Everyman,  de  vraag  naar  de  prioriteit  op- 
meow  onderzoeht,"  1902  ;  J.  M.  Manly  —  P.  A.  Wood,  "El- 
ckerlijc-Everyman:  The  Question  of  Priority."  Mod.  Phil,, 
viii  (1910),  269-302. 

V«^k 


<  Ci.-*U    (|^  x.  ix  . 


CHAPTER  III 

THE   TUDOR   INTERLUDE 

IT  is  not  possible  to  distinguish  clearly  between  the 
morality  and  the  interlude.  Both  titles  are  applied,  it 
would  seem  interchangeably,  and  from  a  very  early 
date,  to  the  symbolic  class  of  drama.  However,  the 
term  "interlude"  came  more  and  more  to  be  employed 
during  the  Tudor  period,  as  the  plays  grew  shorter  and 
more  courtly,  and  as  the  gradual  disappearance  of 
the  religious  element  rendered  the  expression  "moral 
play  "  increasingly  a  misnomer.  By  the  commencement 
of  Elizabeth's  reign,  "interlude"  and  "comedy"  are 
practically  the  only  living  terms.  If  a  distinction  be- 
tween morality  and  interlude  is  at  all  to  be  drawn  on 
the  ground  of  contemporary  usage,  it  will  apply,  prob- 
ably, rather  to  the  mode  of  performance  than  to  the 
subject  matter.  Papers  in  a  law-suit  concerning  John 
Rastell  the  printer,  about  1530,  discriminate  between 
"stage-plays"  in  summer  and  "interludes"  in  winter;1 
where  it  is  evident  that  the  former  term  designates 
plays  acted  in  the  old  morality  fashion  on  fixed  out-of- 
door  stages,  before  a  large  public,  while  interludes  were 
performed  indoors,  generally  in  private  houses  and 
before  a  limited  circle.  As  might  be  expected,  the  pro- 
fits are  mentioned  as  being  considerably  greater  in  the 
former  case.  We  learn  that  the  same  stage  costumes 
were  employed  in  both  instances,  and  it  is  very  likely 
that  a  popular  morality  —  if  not  too  long  or  didactic  — 
1  Cf.  A.  W.  Pollard.  Fifteenth  Century  Prose  and  Verse,  316. 


70  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

might  be  acted  in  summer  in  the  ancient  manner,  and 
in  winter  might  be  made  to  do  double  service  as  inter- 
lude at  state  banquets  and  upon  similar  occasions. 

This  difference  is  much  the  same  as  that  which  a 
little  later  existed  between  performances  in  the  public 
theatres  and  quasi-private  performances  in  the  inns  of 
court  or  the  great  palaces.  The  play  and  the  actors 
might  be  the  same, — many  of  Shakespeare's  plays,  for 
instance,  were  acted  both  publicly  and  privately, — but 
the  ideal  requirements  differed,  and  tended  to  diverge 
further  as  time  went  on.  It  is  interesting  that,  whereas 
the  great  drama  of  Shakespeare's  time  developed  itself 
mainly  as  an  answer  to  the  demands  of  popular  perform- 
ance, the  Tudor  interlude  is  directly  the  product  of  the 
private,  indoor  representations. 

The  essential  requisites  of  the  interlude  were  brevity 
and  wit.  The  precise  original  sense  of  the  word  is  dis- 
puted, but  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  was  understood  in 
Tudor  times  to  mean  a  short  play  exhibited  by  profes- 
sionals at  the  meals  of  the  great  and  on  other  occasions 
where  later  masques  would  have  been  fashionable.1 
Normally  the  interlude  inherited  and  continued  the 
abstractions  of  the  morality,  but  there  was  a  tendency 
toward  the  introduction  of  concrete  dramatis  persona, 
which  in  some  of  the  later  instances  supplant  alto- 
gether the  older  allegorical  figures.  No  better  account 
of  the  circumstances  and  manner  of  presentation  of  a 
typical  interlude  can  be  found  than  that  contained  in 
the  fourth  act  of  the  play  of  "Sir  Thomas  More." 

1  On  the  derivation  of  the  word,  see  Chambers,  Mediaeval  Stage,  ii, 
181-183.  The  term  seems  first  to  be  used  in  a  dramatic  sense  in  con- 
nection with  the  fragmentary  Interludium  de  Clerico  et  Puella  printed 
from  a  British  Museum  MS.  by  W.  Heuser,  Anglia,  xxx  (1907),  306  ff. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  71 

The  mystery  play,  largely  in  the  hands  of  the  civic 
middle  class,  was  distinctly  bourgeois  in  spirit,  and  the  -^ 
primitive  morality  tended  strongly  to  plebeianism. 
The  interlude,  on  the  contrary,  is  throughout  its  career 
an  essentially  aristocratic  species.  As  a  result,  this  last 
type  of  drama  responds^wilh  the  greatest  fidelity  to  all 
the  conflicting  waves  of  feeling  raised  by  ebb  or  flow 
of  Tudor  Renaissance  and  Reformation,  —  manifesta- 
tions which,  as  we  have  seen,  hardly  affected  the  con- 
servative mystery.  The  interlude  possessed  no  rw 
inertia.  It  yielded  to  the  slightest  pressure  of  public 
opinion,  and  while  keeping  in  greater  or  smaller  degree 
the  plot  outlines  inherited  from  the  morality,  devel- 
oped them  in  the  spirit  most  popular  at  the  moment 
with  its  enlightened  and  progressive  public. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  occasions  which  called  into 
existence  this  particular  modification  of  the  allegorical 
drama  —  occasions  of  special  revelry  or  rejoicing  — 
desired  no  retention  of  the  grim  tone  of  the  strict 
moral  play.  Nor  would  they  be  satisfied  with  the  crude 
patchwork  of  didacticism  and  obscenity  offered  to 
rustic  audiences.  Very  early  in  the  Tudor  period, 
therefore,  we  find  the  nature  of  the  morality  radically 
altered.  The  change  was  gradual,  but  it  made  for 
catholicity  and  variety:  it  substituted  for  the  single 
interest  in  abstractions  of  good  and  evil  a  number  of 
different  secular  interests. 

The  first  stage  in  the  development  of  the  interlude, 
manifesting  itself  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VII  contem- 
poraneously with  the  earliest  indications  of  the  Revival 
of  Letters,  consists  in  the  mere  shift  of  attention  from 
moral  to  intellectual  abstractions.  The  play  of  "Na- 
ture," written  by  Henry  Medwall,  chaplain  to  Cardinal 


72  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Morton,  and  acted  before  the  latter  some  time  previous 
to  his  death  in  1500,  is  essentially  a  morality  of  the  old 
type;  but  it  shows  variations  which  are  significant. 
The  fact  of  presentation  before  an  audience  alive  to  the 
value  of  time  and  impatient  of  boredom  has  obliged 
the  somewhat  prolix  author  to  divide  his  piece  summa- 
rily in  the  middle,  deferring  the  later  half  to  another 
occasion.  There  is  no  artistic  reason  for  the  break, 
which  would  seem  to  have  been  distasteful  to  the  poet, 
since  he  closes  his  first  instalment  of  fourteen  hundred 
lines  with  the  plaintive  remark:  — 

"And  for  thys  seson 
Here  we  make  an  end, 
Lest  we  shuld  offend 
Thys  audyence,  as  god  defend 
It  were  not  to  be  don. 
Ye  shall  vnderstand  neuer  the  lesse 
That  there  ys  myche  more  of  thys  processe 
Wherein  we  shall  do  our  besyness 
And  our  true  endeuure 
To  shew  yt  vnto  you  after  our  guyse. 
When  my  lord  shall  so  deuyse 
I  shalbe  at  hys  pleasure."  1 

"  Nature "  purports   to  deal  with  man's   passage 
through  the  world  from  infancy  to  old  age,  with  his  vari- 

1  That  Medwall  was  by  no  means  unduly  solicitous  concerning 
the  patience  of  his  hearers  is  shown  by  an  anecdote  relating  to  his 
lost  play  of  The  Finding  of  Truth  performed  before  Henry  VIII  some 
fifteen  years  later  (at  Richmond,  Christmas,  1514-1515).  On  this 
occasion  an  extant  document  informs  us  that  "Inglyshe,  and  the 
others  of  the  Kynges  pleyers,  after  pleyed  an  Interluyt,  whiche  was 
wryten  by  Mayster  Midwell,  but  yt  was  so  long  yt  was  not  lykyd. 
)  ...  The  foolys  part  was  the  best,  but  the  kyng  departyd  bef or  the 
end  to  hys  chambre."  Cf.  Collier,  i,  69  (ed.  1879). 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  73 

ous  lapses  into  sin  and  his  ultimate  repentance;  but  the 
theme  is  discussed  from  a  purely  ethical,  not  religious 
standpoint.  There  is  no  question  here  of  God  or  Devil, 
Heaven  or  Hell,  in  the  Christian  sense.  Rather,  the 
supreme  power —  under  "Th*  almighty  god  that  made 
eche  creature"  —  is  Nature,  who  begins  with  a  long 
preamble  describing  mundane  phenomena  and  exhort- 
ing Man  to  study  "  Arystotell,  my  phylosopher  electe." 
As  in  "Mind,  Will,  and  Understanding,"  man  is  said 
to  be  governed  by  the  hostile  forces  of  Reason  and 
Sensuality;  but  these  powers  no  longer  appear  abso- 
lutely good  or  evil,  symbols  of  God  and  sin  respec- 
tively, as  in  the  earlier  play.1  To  the  author  of  "Na- 
ture," Reason  and  Sensuality  are  both  necessary,  but 
the  force  of  Reason  is  to  be  kept  in  the  ascendancy. 
Man  sins,  not  because  he  alienates  himself  from  God, 
but  because  he  dethrones  Reason.  "  Nature"  is  an  elabo- 
rate piece,  doubtless  performed  by  choir-boys.  The  first 
half  contains  ten  speaking  parts,  the  second  eighteen, 
of  which,  however,  those  representing  the  seven  vir- 
tues and  the  less  prominent  vices  are  very  slight.  The 
prevailing  dreariness  of  the  play  is  mitigated  by  some 
fairly  good  scenes  of  low  comedy. 

In  "Nature,"  which  dates  from  about  the  middle  of 
the  reign  of  Henry  VII,  we  note  the  substitution  of 
semi-pagan,  renaissance  ethics  for  the  religion  of  the 
morality.  In  a  slightly  later  play  of  the  same  type  the 
new  influences  in  scholarship  are  reflected  even  more 
strongly.  "A  new  interlude  and  a  merry  of  the  Nature 
of  the  Four  Elements,  declaring  many  proper  points  of 
philosophy  natural,  and  of  divers  strange  lands,  and  of 
divers  strange  effects  and  causes,"  was  written  by  John 
»  Cf.  p.  62. 


1 


74  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Rastell  and  probably  published  by  him.1  A  reference 
to  "the  noble  king  of  late  memory,  The  most  wise 
prince,  the  seventh  Herry,"  puts  the  date  of  composi- 
tion later  than  Henry  VII  's  death  in  1509;  while  an- 
other allusion  to  new  lands  found  westward  "now 
within  these  twenty  years  "  would,  if  taken  literally, 
date  the  play  before  1512.  It  is  rather  more  probable, 
however,  that  the  author  refers  to  the  discovery  of  the 
new  lands,  not  by  Columbus,  but  by  Americus  Ves- 
pucci and  by  Cabot,  both  of  whose  voyages,  in  1497  and 
1498  respectively,  are  elsewhere  mentioned.  If  this  be 
so,  the  end  of  the  twenty-year  period  would  be  1517- 
1518,  the  years  apparently  immediately  preceding  the 
publication  of  this  "new"  interlude.2 

There  is  no  religion  whatever  in  "The  Four  Ele- 
ments," but  the  work  contains  an  amount  of  intellec- 
tual edification  which  is  stupendous.  The  characters 
are  the  following:  A  Messenger,  Natura  Naturata, 
Humanity,  Studious  Desire,  Sensual  Appetite,  a  Tav- 
erner,  Experience,  and  Ignorance.  "Also,"  we  are  told, 
"if  ye  list,  ye  may  bring  in  a  Disguising."  At  the  be- 
ginning appears  in  true  dissertational  manner  a  state- 
ment of  the  cosmographical  theses  to  be  maintained; 
viz.,  "Of  the  situation  of  the  four  elements,  that  is  to 
say,  the  earth,  the  water,  the  air,  the  fire,  and  of  their 
qualities  and  properties,  and  of  the  generation  and  cor- 
ruption of  things  made  of  the  commixtion  of  them. 

"Of  certain  conclusions  proving  that  the  earth  must 

1  The  ascription  of  authorship  depends  upon  John  Bale.  Cf. 
article  on  Rastell  in  I).  N.  B. 

1  The  extant  edition  is  dated  1519  by  Hazlitt  (Dodsley,  vol.  i)  on 
the  doubtful  authority  of  a  manuscript  insertion  in  the  fragmentary 
British  Museum  copy. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  75 

needs  be  round,  and  that  it  hangeth  in  the  midst  of 
the  firmament,  and  that  it  is  in  circumference  above 
21,000  miles,  etc." 

In  a  long  prologue  of  nearly  one  hundred  and  fifty 
lines,  the  Messenger  introduces  this 

"little  interlude,  late  made  and  prepared  — 
Which  of  a  few  conclusions  is  contrived, 
And  points  of  philosophy  natural," 

deploring  the  poverty  of  learned  works  in  the  English 
tongue  as  compared  with  the  Greek  and  Latin,  and 
the  tendency  of  ignorant  writers 

"  New  books  to  compile  and  ballads  to  endite 
Some  of  love  or  other  matter  not  worth  a  mite." 

The  plot  is  negligible.  Nature,  Studious  Desire,  and 
Experience  all  take  turns  in  unfolding  to  Humanity, 
with  the  aid  of  a  globe,  the  secrets  of  this  earth  and  of 
the  visible  universe.  For  a  time  the  pupil  plays  truant, 
and  goes  off  with  Sensual  Appetite,  Ignorance,  and  the 
Taverner  to  feast  and  revel;  but  his  enjoyment,  like 
that  of  the  reader,  is  half-hearted,  and  he  is  easily  won 
back  to  the  pursuit  of  knowledge.  Some  effort  is  made 
at  spectacular  effect  in  the  way  of  comic  song  and 
dance,  but  this  is,  like  the  Disguising,  which  is  to  be 
brought  in  "if  ye  list,"  only  a  sop  to  the  spectators, 
who,  as  the  author  very  justly  feared,  might  not  other- 
wise endure  his  tedious  instruction.  That  the  piece  was 
felt  to  trespass  on  the  patience  of  its  hearers  is  evident 
from  the  title-page,  which  admits  that  if  played  in 
full,  it  "will  contain  the  space  of  an  hour  and  a  half;  but 
if  ye  list,  ye  may  leave  out  much  of  the  sad  matter,  as 
the  Messenger's  part,  and  some  of  Nature's  part,  and 


76  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

some  of  Experience's  part,  and  yet  the  matter  will  de- 
pend conveniently,  and  then  it  will  not  be  past  three 
quarters  of  an  hour  of  length."  It  is  evident  that  this 
Tudor  audience  has  advanced  very  far  beyond  that 
which  was  content  to  witness  "The  Castle  of  Perse- 
verance," when  it  declines  to  put  up  with  too  much 
"sad"  matter,  and  prefers  not  to  be  detained  above 
three  quarters  of  an  hour. 

Several  other  educational  interludes  exist.  John 
Bedford's  undated  play  of  "  Wyt  and  Science"  relates 
the  rather  lamentable  adventures  of  the  foolish  young 
Wit,  who  sets  out  to  woo  and  marry  his  natural  com- 
plement, Science,  daughter  of  Reason  and  Experience. 
In  his  wanderings  he  is  grievously  mauled  by  the  giant 
Tediousness,  and  gulled  by  Idleness  and  Ignorance;  but 
he  is  saved  at  last  from  error,  avenges  himself  with  the 
aid  of  his  servants  Instruction,  Diligence,  and  Study, 
upon  the  giant,  and  wins  the  lady  Science.  The  con- 
temporary popularity  of  this  rather  dull  piece  is  at- 
tested by  the  existence  of  two  imitations.  "The  Mar- 
riage of  Wit  and  Science,"  licensed  for  publication  in 
1569-1570,  shows  the  taste  for  allegory  on  the  wane. 
Wit,  Will,  and  several  of  the  other  characters  are  pretty 
concrete  personages,  and  the  author  has  evidently  tried 
hard  to  evolve  a  romantic  plot  out  of  his  unadaptable 
material.  Tediousness,  in  particular,  is  changed  from  a 
pedagogical  symbol  into  a  bogey  of  nursery  tale  pro- 
portions, and  he  here  plays  somewhat  the  r61e  of 
dragon  to  Science's  Andromeda  and  Wit's  Perseus. 
The  careful  division  of  this  piece  into  acts,  and  the 
employment  of  the  typically  Elizabethan  alexandrines 
and  "  f  ourteeners  "  in  place  of  the  older  irregular  verse, 
bear  out  the  indications  of  spirit  and  tone  in  showing 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  77 

the  play  to  have  been  written  very  shortly  before  it  was 
published. 

Another  interlude  apparently  indebted  to  Redford, 
and  one  of  the  most  interesting  of  its  class,  is  "The 
Marriage  of  Wit  and  Wisdom,"  written  by  one  Francis 
Merbury,1  and  prepared  for  publication  in  1579,2 
though  probably  composed  somewhat  earlier.  This 
play  also  shows  allegory  largely  neglected  in  the  new 
interest  in  plot  and  character.  There  are  a  great  num- 
ber of  figures,  but  the  author  is  careful  to  suggest  how 
all  the  parts  can  be  filled  by  six  actors.  With  equal  con- 
sideration he  has  sought  to  explain  the  weaknesses  and 
inconsistencies  in  Wit's  character  by  making  him  son 
to  the  ill-matched  couple,  Severity  and  Indulgence. 
Wit  suffers  in  this  work  truly  double  measure  for  all 
his  follies,  since  in  addition  to  the  giant,  who  is  here 
called  Irksomeness,  he  falls  into  the  hands  of  a  new  and 
most  accomplished  mischief-maker  in  the  person  of 
"Idleness  the  vice."  There  is  really  little  but  the  bare 
shell  left  of  the  old  academic  allegory.  Six  of  the  fig- 
ures —  Catch  and  Snatch,  Mother  Bee,  Lob,  Doll,  and 
Search  —  have  no  connection  with  the  symbolical  part 
of  the  story;  and  Idleness  himself  so  far  belies  his  name 
that  he  is  almost  the  only  person  in  the  drama  who  dis- 
plays a  proper  energy.  The  poet  has  managed  to  get 
into  the  piece  enough  of  irrelevant  farce  and  melo- 
dramatic interest  to  make  it  tolerable  reading:  it  is 

1  The  identification  of  the  author  rests  upon  the  concluding  word* 
of  the  manuscript,  "Amen  quoth  fra  Merbury." 

1  The  manuscript  is  not  known  to  have  been  actually  printed 
before  1840;  but  that  publication  was  intended  is  clear  from  the 
general  form  of  the  MS.  title-page  and  from  the  phrase  "neuer 
btfore  imprinted." 


a 


78  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

much  the  most  engaging  of  the  three  related  plays, 
and  at  the  same  time  the  least  faithful  example  of  the 
interlude. 

The  changed  spirit  which  came  into  fashionable 
drama  with  the  Renaissance  is  well  illustrated  in  "The 
World  and  the  Child,"  printed  by  Wynkyn  de  Worde 
in  1522.  This  play  takes  over  the  plot  of  the  old  morali- 
ties with  no  such  conscious  adaptation  as  is  seen  in 
those  we  have  just  been  discussing,  but  develops  it  in 
what  was  for  the  drama  an  entirely  new  spirit.  The 
ostensible  scope  of  "The  World  and  the  Child"  is 
almost  as  great  as  that  of  "  The  Castle  of  Perseverance," 
from  which,  directly  or  indirectly,  it  may  have  derived 
the  story.  It  treats  Man's  life  from  childhood  to  old 
age,  his  progress  through  the  successive  steps  of  sin,  his 
repentance,  relapse,  and  final  conversion  by  Conscience 
and  Perseverance.  But  the  old  theme  is  elaborated 
with  considerable  novelty.  The  first  striking  feature 
is  the  tendency  to  condensation;  only  five  characters 
appear,  and  man's  whole  career  is  disposed  of  in  nine 
hundred  and  seventy-nine  lines.  The  attitude  toward 
life  is  entirely  altered  from  that  of  the  medisevalist 
authors  of  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance"  and  "Every- 
man." This  world  is  no  longer  a  vale  of  sorrows.  It  is 
a  place  of  manifold  experiences,  unedifying  for  the  most 
part,  no  doubt,  but  full  of  the  most  unquestionable 
zest.  Except  for  the  last  pages,  where  the  poet  reverts 
to  the  conventional  conclusion,  the  representation  is  no 
longer  didactic :  it  is  truly  drajpaatjc.  We  find  the  teem- 
ing life  of  the  city  where  before  we  met  abstractions  of 
virtue  or  vice.  Realism  has  here  progressed  far  beyond 
that  universal  peasant  scurrility  which  plays  so  great  a 
part  in  "Mankind."  It  has  become  definitely  pictorial 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  79 

Drollery  has  taken  to  itself  a  local  habitation,  and  the 
spectator  is  presented  for  perhaps  the  first  time  in  Eng- 
lish drama  with  a  somewhat  comprehensive  view  of  the 
actual  life  of  London  streets.  There  is  nothing  new,  of 
course,  in  this  genre.  All  that  we  find  in  "The  World 
and  the  Child"  can  be  found  more  abundantly  in 
"  Piers  the  Plowman"  and  in  Chaucer.  There  has  even 
been  pointed  out  recently  a  most  interesting  specific 
indebtedness  of  the  play  to  an  early  fifteenth-century 
poem  called  "The  Mirror  of  the  Periods  of  Man's 
Life." l  But  the  transference  of  this  spirit  from  narra- 
tive to  dramatic  poetry  is  an  important  step.  It  shows 
the  interlude  awaking  to  a  sense  of  the  inherent  inter- 
est of  actual  life,  and  heralds  from  afar  a  long  line  of 
realistic  comedies  such  as  "Bartholomew  Fair,"  "The 
Puritan,"  and  "The  London  Prodigal." 

There  is  no  doubt  that  "The  World  and  the  Child" 
was  written  con  amore.  In  some  way  the  hackneyed 
theme  is  freshened  for  the  reader,  and  the  life  of  Man  is 
given  a  novelty  in  each  of  its  six  stages  of  Dalliance, 
Wanton,  Lust-and-Liking,  Manhood,  Shame,  and  Age. 
As  examples  of  the  new  tone  one  might  instance  young 
Wanton's  description  of  his  own  character:  — 

"If  brother  or  syster  do  me  chyde, 
I  wyll  scratche  and  also  byte; 
I  can  crye  and  also  kyke 
And  mocke  them  all  be  rewe. 
If  fader  or  moder  wyll  me  smyte, 
I  wyll  wrynge  with  my  lyppe 
And  lyghtly  from  hym  make  a  skyppe 
And  call  my  dame  shrewe"; 

1  See  H.  N.  MacCracken,  "A  Source  of  Mundus  et  Infans,"  PubL 
Mod.  Lang.  Attoc.,  xxiii  (1908),  486  ff. 


80  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

and  the  wonderfully  infectious  stanza  in  which  Man- 
hood turns  his  back  upon  the  straight  and  narrow 
path:  — 

"Now  I  wyll  folowe  Folye, 

For  Folye  is  my  man. 

Ye,  Folye  is  my  felowe 

And  hath  gyuen  me  a  name: 

Conscyence  called  me  Manhode, 

Folye  calleth  me  Shame." 

"Hickscorner,"  printed  like  "The  World  and  the 
Child"  by  Wynkyn  de  Worde,  but  without  date,  be- 
longs to  the  same  general  type  of  reduced  and  secular- 
ized morality.  It  has  been  regarded  as  a  controversial 
play  in  defence  of  the  Roman  Church,  a  theory  which 
receives  support  from  the  definite  references  to  the 
contemporary  irreligious  state  of  England  and  from  the 
names  given  to  the  vices.1  Its  realism  is  of  the  localized 
London  sort  found  in  "The  World  and  the  Child," 
and  it  represents  a  still  farther  advance  in  structure. 
There  are  here  six  characters :  three  vices  (Hick-scorner, 
Imagination,  and  Freewill)  pitted  against  three  virtues 
(Pity,  Contemplation,  and  Perseverance).  The  awk- 
ward lay-figure,  Mankind,  has  been  boldly  thrown 
overboard,  and  the  play  moves  the  more  lightly  without 
him.  We  have  thus  the  elements  of  a  true  dramatic 
conflict  where  the  actors  contend  whole-heartedly  by 
reason  of  some  cause  of  opposition  within  themselves, 
and  the  suggestion  of  dogs  snarling  over  a  bone  in  the 
shape  of  poor  mortality's  soul  is  no  longer  forced 
upon  us. 

1  Professor  Creizenach  finds  a  noteworthy  similarity,  which  I  do 
not  fully  perceive,  between  Hickscorner  and  The  Interlude  of  Youth. 
Cf.  Geschichte  des  neueren  Dramas,  iii,  503,  504. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  81 

All  the  writers  of  interludes  based  on  the  morality 
plot  of  the  battle  of  vices  and  virtues  were  confronted 
with  this  problem:  what  to  do  with  the  central  figure, 
Mankind,  a  character  much  too  vague  and  comprehen- 
sive as  he  stood  either  to  be  individualized  in  accord- 
ance with  the  new  requirements  of  dramatic  action,  or 
to  be  reduced  into  proportion  with  the  smaller  scope 
and  more  trivial  interests  of  the  fashionable  interlude. 
The  author  of  "The  World  and  the  Child"  begs  the 
question  by  virtually  splitting  Mankind  into  six  parts 
and  treating  each  separately.  The  author  of  "Hick- 
scorner  "  throws  him  out  altogether  and  sacrifices  with 
him  the  cohesion  of  the  play,  though  the  gain  in  vivid- 
ness compensates  on  the  whole  for  the  injury  to  the 
plot.  The  more  popular  and  successful  course,  how- 
ever, was  to  select  for  treatment  one  particular  division 
of  Mankind's  history,  and  to  devote  the  attention 
solely  to  that.  The  division  selected  was  naturally  that 
of  youth,  which  offered  freest  play  alike  to  the  educa- 
tional and  to  the  melodramatic  propensities  of  the  time. 
Mankind,  reduced  to  Youth,  becomes  a  sufficiently 
tangible  conception,  with  definite  faults  and  follies,  and 
yields  abundant  opportunity  for  individualization. 

Two  well-known  plays  in  this  manner  are  "The 
Interlude  of  Youth"  and  "Lusty  Juventus,"  both  of 
which  deal  with  the  seduction  of  their  hero  by  the 
temptations  proper  to  his  age  and  with  his  ultimate 
conversion.  It  is  unfortunate  that  both  these  pieces, 
written  relatively  late,  during  the  heat  of  the  final 
Reformation  struggle,  and  championing  the  causes  of 
Roman  Catholicism  and  Protestantism  respectively, 
have  too  much  interest  in  the  polemics  of  the  hour  to 
develop  fully  the  dramatic  possibilities  of  their  subject* 


82  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

This  is  especially  the  case  with  the  anti-popish  "Ju- 
ventus,"  which  devotes  pages  to  exposing  the  fallacy  of 
the  doctrine  of  salvation  by  works,  and  to  reprehend- 
ing the  idolatrous  practices  of  the  mediaeval  church. 
For  all  that,  "Lusty  Juventus"  contains  two  of  the 
finest  songs  to  be  found  in  the  pre-Elizabethan  drama, 
and  its  main  comic  scene  was  paid  the  compliment  of 
plagiarism  by  the  author  of  the  mock  interlude  in  "Sir 
Thomas  More." 

The  argumentative  tone  of  these  last  two  plays  is 
shared  by  a  considerable  group  of  interludes  belonging 
to  the  period  of  the  Reformation,  which  concern  them- 
selves rather  with  opinions  than  with  morals,  facts,  or 
manners.  The  dramatic  framework  is  here  filled  out, 
not  with  discussions  of  pedagogical  import,  or  with 
humorous  matter  derived  from  the  follies  of  common 
life,  but  with  satire  directed  against  particular  theories 
in  religion  or  politics.  It  was  natural  that  this  species 
of  interlude  should  keep  itself  somewhat  closer  than 
the  others  to  the  form  of  moral  allegory  from  which 
they  all  descended.  Symbolic  abstractions  could  here 
be  put  to  use  in  a  way  hardly  possible  elsewhere. 

The  first  important  political  allegory  in  the  form  of 
interlude  is  the  "Magnificence"  of  John  Skelton.  Just 
as  we  have  seen  the  stock  abstractions  of  the  old  drama 
shifted  in  plays  like  "The  Four  Elements"  and  "Wit 
and  Science"  from  the  domain  of  religion  to  that  of 
knowledge,  so  here  we  find  them  introduced  into  the 
arena  of  state-craft.  The  central  figure  is  no  longer 
frail  and  sinful  mankind;  he  is  Magnificence,  a  worldly 
prince,  surrounded  by  good  and  evil  counsellors,  drawn 
into  extravagance  and  misgovernment  by  the  advice 
of  self-seekers,  and  rescued  finally  from  the  ensuing 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  88 

embarrassments  by  his  true  advisers.  The  date  of  this 
play  is  about  1516,  the  period  of  Wolsey's  greatest 
power,  and  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  its  intention 
was  to  point  out  the  danger  of  the  latter's  ambitious 
and  wasteful  polity  at  home  and  abroad,  while  cov- 
ertly championing  the  side  of  Skelton's  patron,  the 
Duke  of  Norfolk,  and  the  older  nobility.  The  charac- 
ters are  all  political  types  with  such  names  as  Felicity, 
Liberty,  Measure,  Counterfeit  Countenance,  Crafty 
Conveyance,  Cloaked  Collusion,  and  Courtly  Abusion. 
The  work  extends  to  more  than  twenty-five  hundred 
lines,  and,  like  the  not  dissimilar  Scottish  "Three  Es- 
tates" of  twenty  years  later,  is  too  intricately  con- 
structed to  be  easily  summarized.1 

The  religious  controversy  of  the  later  years  of 
Henry  VIII  and  the  animosities  incident  to  the  reigns 
of  Edward  VI  and  Mary  were  prolific  of  dramas  which, 
under  cover  of  abstract  figures,  supported  one  or  an- 
other of  the  factions  in  Church  and  State.  Such  was, 
doubtless,  the  lost  play  of  Lord  Governance  and  Lady 
Public- Weal,  acted  at  Gray's  Inn,  Christmas,  1526- 
1527,  and  described  in  considerable  detail  by  the  chron- 
icler, Hall.2  Wolsey,  imagining  that  a  satire  against 
himself  was  intended,  imprisoned  the  author,  John 
Roo,  and  one  of  the  actors  in  the  Fleet,  whence  they 
were  released  upon  the  explanation  —  perhaps  not  alto- 
gether true  —  that  the  play  had  been  "compyled  for 
the  moste  part  ...  20  yere  past,  and  long  before  the 
Cardinal!  had  any  authoritie. "  A  little  later  in  the 
same  year  (November  10,  1527)  a  Latin  play  pre- 

1  See  the  admirable  introduction  to  the  play,  by  R.  L.  Ramsay, 
in  the  Early  English  Text  Society  edition. 
*  Hall's  Chronicle,  ed.  1809,  719. 


84  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

sented  before  the  King  and  the  French  ambassa- 
dors introduced  satirical  portraits  of  the  "errytyke 
Lewter"  and  of  Luther's  wife  among  more  conven- 
tional figures  like  Religion,  Ecclesia,  Veritas,  Heresy, 
False  Interpretation,  and  Corupcyo^scryptorris  (sic). 
A  strong  Protestant  animus  evidently  inspired  the  lost 
plays  of  Thomas  Wylley,  Vicar  of  Yoxford,  Suffolk, 
who  in  a  letter  addressed  to  Cromwell  about  1535  ap- 
peals for  support  against  the  hostility  of  the  conserva- 
tive priests  of  his  county,  and  mentions  four  polemical 
dramas  of  his  composition:  "A  Reverent  Receyvyng 
of  the  Sacrament  .  .  .  declaryd  by  vi  chyldren,  repre- 
sentyng  Chryst,  the  worde  of  God,  Paule,  Austyn,  a 
Chylde,  a  Nonne  called  Ignorancy";  "a  play  agaynst 
the  popys  Counselers,  Error,  Colle  dogger  of  Con- 
scyens,  and  Incredulyte";  "A  Rude  Commynawlte"; 
and  "The  Woman  on  the  Rokke,  yn  the  fyer  of  faythe 
a  fynyng,  and  a  purgyng  in  the  trewe  purgatory." 

The  same  spirit  appears  in  several  extant  works  of 
unambitious  scope.  "The  Booke  in  Meeter  of  Robin 
Conscience:  against  his  Father  Couetousnesse,  his 
Mother  Newgise,  and  his  Sister  Proud  Beautye"  is  not 
a  play.  It  is  composed  in  rime  royal  stanzas  of  very 
artificial  structure,  and  consists  of  three  separate  de- 
bates between  Robin  Conscience,  apparently  an  apos- 
tle of  the  new  religion,  and  each  of  his  worldly  rela- 
tives. A  stronger  controversial  tone  pervades  two 
contemporary  dialogues,  embedded  in  prose  polemical 
matter  and  clearly  not  intended  for  presentation.  The 
"brefe  Dialoge  betwene  two  prestes  servauntis  named 
Watkyn  and  Jeffraye"  makes  up  the  principal  portion 
of  the  bitterly  anti-Wolseyan  "Rede  Me  and  Be  Not 
Wrothe,"  printed  at  Strassburg  in  1528;  and  "A 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  85 

proper  dyaloge  betwene  a  Gentillman  and  a  husband- 
man eche  complaynynge  to  other  their  miserable 
calamite  through  the  ambicion  of  the  clergye,"  pub- 
lished in  1530  "at  Marborow  in  the  lande  of  Hessen," 
also,  of  course,  by  an  English  religious  exile,  was  curi- 
ously supplemented  by  "  an  olde  [Lollard]  treaty se  made 
aboute  the  tyme  of  kynge  Rycharde  the  seconde." 

A  much  more  genuine  dramatic  value  attaches  to  the 
interlude  of  "John  Bon  and  Mast  Parson,"  a  piece 
containing  only  about  one  hundred  and  seventy  lines 
and  introducing  merely  the  two  interlocutors  named  in 
the  title.  The  topic  of  this  dialogue  is  the  theory  of 
transubstantiation  and  the  resultant  feast  of  Corpus 
Christi,  —  matters  which,  as  has  been  seen,  had  power- 
fully influenced  the  earliest  forms  of  English  drama. 
The  author  of  "John  Bon"  has  combined,  not  unsuc- 
cessfully, the  dialogue  form  and  rough  wit  of  Hey- 
wood  with  Bale's  sharpness  of  religious  argumentation, 
and  his  work,  short  and  unpretending  though  it  is,  is 
one  of  the  most  pleasing  of  the  theological  interludes 
of  the  period. 

A  somewhat  later  and  vastly  more  important  exam- 
ple of  controversial  drama  is  the  "  merye  enterlude  en- 
titled Respublica,  made  in  the  yeare  of  our  Lorde 
1553,  and  the  first  yeare  of  the  moost  prosperous 
Reigne  of  our  moste  gracious  Soueraigne  Quene  Marye 
the  first."  The  original  list  of  the  dramatis  persona 
is  interesting:  — 

The  Partes  and  Names  of  the  Plaiers. 
The  Prologue,  a  Poete. 
Avarice  allias  Policie,  the  vice  of  the  plaie. 
Insolence,  "        Authoritie,  the  chief  gallaunt. 


86  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Oppression  alii  as  Reformation,  an  other  gallaunt. 
Adulation  Honestie,  the  third  gallaunt. 

People,  representing  the  poore  Commontie. 
Respublica,  a  wydowe. 
Misericordia 

Veritas  ,          T    ,. 

T    J_.  .  f  fowre  Ladies, 

lusticia 

Pax 

Nemesis,  the  goddes  of  redresse  and  correction,  a 
goddesse. 

"Respublica"  is  a  play  political  rather  than  secta- 
rian. There  is  interesting,  though  not  convincing  rea- 
son for  the  theory  that  it  was  written  by  Nicholas 
Udall,  the  author  of  "  Ralph  Roister  Doister."  *  The  plot 
concerns  the  sufferings  of  the  widow  Respublica,  the 
Commonwealth  of  England,  and  her  servant  People  at 
the  hands  of  the  rapacious  counsellors  who  during  the 
last  two  reigns  had  despoiled  the  Church  and  wasted 
the  revenues  of  the  Crown.  At  last,  of  course,  Nemesis 
steps  in,  in  the  person  of  Queen  Mary,  whereupon  the 
false  stewards  are  revealed  in  their  true  characters  and 
are  forced  to  make  restitution  of  their  ill-gotten  gains. 

The  opposite  side  in  the  controversy  was  ardently 
espoused  by  John  Bale,  who  spent  two  periods  of 
Catholic  ascendancy  (1540-1547,  1553-1558)  in  exile 
by  reason  of  his  violently  expressed  religious  views; 
and,  for  doubtless  the  same  cause,  was  preferred  during 
the  Protestant  reign  of  Edward  VI  to  the  bishopric  of 
Ossory  in  Ireland.  In  three  strange  "interludes,"  gen- 
erally referred  to  in  abbreviated  title  as  "God's  Pro- 
mises," "John  Baptist,"  and  "The  Temptation  of  our 

1  See  L.  A.  Magnus,  Introduction  to  E.  E.  T.  S.  ed.,  xii-xxii. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  87 

Lord,"  all  said  to  have  been  written  in  1538,  Bale  has 
curiously  blended  the  mystery  and  the  morality  form 
into  a  vehicle  for  the  exposition  of  his  anti-papal  doc- 
trine. A  fourth  play  with  the  same  polemical  bent 
shows  considerably  higher  artistic  development.  "A 
Comedy  concernynge  thre  lawcs,  of  Nature,  Moses, 
and  Christ,  corrupted  by  the  Sodomytes,  Pharysees, 
and  Papystes  "  claims  to  have  been  composed  like  the 
rest  in  1538,  but  references  to  King  Edward,  Queen 
Katherine,  and  "the  noble  lorde  protectour"  in  the 
concluding  stanzas  show  these  at  least  to  have  been 
written  after  1547,  while  the  concluding  words  of  the 
colophon,  "lately  imprented  per  Nicolaum  Bambur- 
gensem"  may  indicate  that  the  piece  was  published  on 
the  Continent  during  Bale's  second  exile.  "The  Three 
Laws"  is  perhaps  the  most  vigorous,  as  it  is  certainly 
one  of  the  most  carefully  composed  of  all  the  Tudor 
controversial  interludes.  Bale,  who  claims  the  distinc- 
tion of  having  first  domesticated  in  English  drama  the 
terms  "comedy"  and  "tragedy,"  is  also  one  of  the 
earliest  writers  to  introduce  the  Latin  division  of  plays 
into  acts;  and  "The  Three  Laws"  shows  perfect  com- 
prehension of  the  capabilities  of  the  five-act  structure. 
Act  I  permits  Deus  Pater  to  introduce  the  three  laws 
and  assign  to  each  a  period  of  guardianship  over  man- 
kind. The  next  three  acts  present  successively  the  sub- 
version of  each  of  these  laws  by  the  embodiment  of 
evil,  Infidelity, and  his  satellites;  while  the  fifth  brings 
the  denouement  in  the  appearance  of  God's  Vengeance, 
the  banishment  of  Infidelity,  and  the  rehabilitation  of 
the  Laws.  The  reference  to  Sodomites  and  Pharisees 
in  the  title  is  delusive.  Bale's  concern  is  exclusively 
with  the  Papists,  whom  he  makes  responsible,  not  only 


88  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

for  the  burning  of  Christ's  Law,  but  for  the  leprosy  of 
the  Law  of  Nature  and  the  blinding  and  laming  of  that 
of  Moses  as  well.  The  six  corrupting  agents,  "vyces  or 
frutes  of  Infydelyte,"  are  all  exponents  of  Romish 
wickedness,  and  Bale  is  careful  that  their  garb  shall 
betray  their  character  to  the  spectators.  Idolatry  is  to 
be  "decked  like  an  old  witch  [i.  e.,  a  vender  of  relics], 
Sodomy  like  a  monk  of  all  sects,  Ambition  like  a 
bishop,  Covetousness  like  a  spiritual  lawyer,  False 
Doctrine  like  a  popish  Doctor,  and  Hypocrisy  like  a 
Grey  Friar."  Bale's  most  famous  play,  "  King  Johan," 
breathes  the  same  spirit,  but  is  so  peculiar  in  form  as 
to  demand  discussion  in  the  next  chapter.  Meanwhile 
the  general  dramatic  method  and  the  religious  tenets  of 
the  earlier  plays  were  taken  over  without  noticeable 
change  by  the  unknown  Protestant  author  of  "New 
Custom,"  who  would  seem  consciously  to  have  adopted 
Bale  as  his  model. 

Beside  the  work  of  Bale,  it  is  proper  to  consider  the 
production  of  another  coarse,  yet  sturdy  and  strikingly 
individual  expositor  of  papal  corruption.  Sir  David 
Lindsay's  "Satire  of  the  Three  Estates"  —  as  nearly 
as  possible  contemporaneous  in  its  different  forms  with 
the  period  of  Bale's  dramatic  activity — is  a  poem 
which  stands  quite  apart  from  the  line  of  English  stage 
progress  by  reason  of  its  uncouth  irregularity  of  form, 
and  still  more  by  its  restriction  to  the  Scots  dialect  and 
the  social  and  political  milieu  of  Edinburgh.  Yet  its 
imposing  bulk  and  weight  of  thought,  its  boldness  in 
meeting  empirically  the  unsolved  problems  of  his- 
trionic presentation,  and  the  neatness  with  which  it 
offers  commentary  and  contrast  to  such  works  as 
"Magnificence,"  "Respublica,"  "The  Three  Laws," 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  89 

and  "  King  Johan,"  make  it  an  important  document 
in  the  history  of  even  the  southern  British  drama. 

"The  Three  Estates"  appears  to  have  been  first 
acted  before  King  James  V  of  Scotland  at  Linlithgow, 
January  6,  1540.  For  a  later  performance  at  Cupar 
in  Fife,  June  7,  1552,  a  number  of  additions  and  local 
references  were  introduced,  and  it  is  substantially  in 
the  form  there  presented  that  the  work  survives.  A 
repetition  of  the  play  two  years  later  (1554),  on  the 
playfield  at  Greenside  near  Edinburgh,  seems  to  have 
involved  no  important  change  in  the  text  prepared  for 
Cupar  of  Fife.  The  only  complete  version  of  the  poem 
was  printed  at  Edinburgh  by  Robert  Charteris  in  1602; 
but  an  important  manuscript,  dating  from  1568,  in- 
cludes a  selection  from  the  more  comic  portions,  and 
derives  special  importance  from  the  fact  that,  although 
it  purports  to  be  based  on  the  text  used  at  Greenside,  it 
preserves  the  only  extant  version  of  the  preliminary 
interlude  which  advertised  the  Cupar  of  Fife  perform- 
ance. This  "  Proclamation  Maid  at  Cowpar  of  Fyffe" 
is  the  precise  equivalent  of  the  introductory  "banns" 
which  had  been  employed  a  full  century  before  to 
announce  the  prospective  exhibition  of  "The  Castle 
of  Perseverance"  and  of  the  mystery  cycle  known 
as  "Ludus  Coventrise." l  The  people  of  the  neighbor- 
hood are  warned  of  the  intended  arrival  of  the  Prince 
and  the  Three  Estates  in  "Cowpar  Town,"  and  are 
further  informed :  — 

"Our  purpose  is  on  the  Sevint  day  of  June, 

Gif  weddir  serve,  and  we  haif  rest  and  pece. 

We  sail  be  sene  intill  our  Playing  place, 

In  gude  array,  abowt  the  hour  of  sevin." 

1  See  pp.  19  and  55-57. 


90  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Let  the  public,  therefore,  get  up  "right  airly"  and 
"disjune"  (i.  e.t  breakfast),  and 

"  Faill  nocht  to  be  upone  the  Castell-hill 
Besyd  the  place  quhair  we  purpoiss  to  play," 

and  let  them  be  prepared  both  for  "sad"  matter  and 
for  bantering. 

It  is  necessary  to  turn  back  to  "The  Castle  of  Perse- 
verance" to  find  in  English  drama  any  parallel  to  the 
tremendous  scope  of  this  play  with  its  two  hundred 
solid  pages  of  verse,  its  equal  appeal  to  the  whole  range 
of  contemporary  society  from  king  to  peasant,  and 
that'grand  mediaeval  leisureliness  and  simplicity  which 
give  it  courage  to  attack  the  entire  visible  fabric  of  life 
from  the  highest  problems  of  morality  and  govern- 
ment to  the  lowest  reaches  of  profane  wit.  It  is  no 
question  here  of  the  small  indoor  stage  and  a  select 
number  of  courtly  auditors.  The  theatre  is  the  "play- 
field  "  out  of  doors,  the  spectators  make  up  the  entire 
population,  and  the  actors  number  at  least  forty.  The 
scene  is  imagined  so  broad  that  messengers  make  jour- 
neys and  return  from  one  side  of  it  to  the  other,  and  a 
dozen  localities  can  be  represented  on  it  concurrently. 
The  king  sits  high  upon  his  throne  and  sees  only  afar 
off  the  petitioners  who  would  have  audience  with  him ; 
a  small  boy  finds  false  relics  in  a  field  upon  a  hill  and 
shouts  to  his  master  in  the  crowd  below;  and  the  stocks 
stand  in  view  through  the  entire  performance,  receiv- 
ing now  the  good  and  now  the  evil  characters.  About 
this  primitive  stage,  as  around  that  on  which  "The 
Castle  of  Perseverance"  was  acted,  stands  a  ditch 
filled  with  real  water,  in  which  the  Sowter's  Wife  can 
wade  waist-deep,  and  into  which  the  cheated  Poor  Man 
tosses  the  Pardoner's  relics. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  01 

It  is  interesting  to  contrast  the  structure  of  this 
Scottish  work  with  that  of  the  only  English  moral  plays 
of  the  century  which  at  all  approach  it  in  length 
and  satiric  purpose  —  Skelton's  "Magnificence"  and 
Bale's  "Three  Laws."  While  Skelton,  by  sticking  dog- 
gedly to  the  thin  and  inadequate  frame  of  the  interlude, 
has  made  his  poem,  however  dull  and  over-weighted,  a 
regular  and,  technically,  even  a  rather  admirable  exam- 
ple of  morality  architecture;  and  while  Bale  intro- 
duces from  classic  act  and  scene  division  the  support 
which  he  needed  for  his  ambitious  satire,  Lindsay 
ignores  equally  the  old  and  the  new  dramatic  models, 
and  wins  attention  by  sheer  force  of  intellect  and  un- 
reasoned brilliance  of  execution.  Independent  farcical 
dialogues,  or  "  interludes,"  as  long  and  as  non-moral  as 
those  of  Heywood,  are  inserted  at  will  in  the  intervals 
between  the  sections  of  a  flagellation  of  ecclesiastical 
hypocrisy  and  greed  more  violent  even  than  Bale's; 
and  the  long  work  wanders  on  with  only  a  thin  thread 
of  story  and  with  no  observable  law  of  growth.  Yet 
"The  Satire  of  the  Three  Estates"  is  a  more  read- 
able play  than  either  "Magnificence"  or  "The  Three 
Laws."  The  very  frankness  of  its  irregularity  disarms 
criticism  and  piques  the  attention;  and  the  photo- 
graphic sincerity  of  all  its  pictures,  whether  of  clownish 
turbulence  or  aristocratic  vice,  largely  justifies  the 
inclusion  of  each  and  goes  far  to  keep  the  varied  ele- 
ments from  clashing. 

Lindsay  had  good  reason  to  entitle  his  work  as  he 
did.  It  is  as  satire  rather  than  as  drama  that  it  gains 
its  effects;  and  it  traces  its  literary  ancestry,  not 
through  the  sequence  of  the  moral  plays,  but  by  way  of 
the  satiric  dialogues  of  Dunbar,  back  to  the  art  form 


92  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  Langland.  In  many  details  of  treatment,  indeed, 
reminiscence  of  "Piers  the  Plowman"  seems  clearly 
evident,  as  in  the  conception  of  the  vices,  Flattery, 
Falsehood,  and  Deceit,  and  the  portrayal  of  their  rela- 
tions with  the  temporal  and  spiritual  classes,  and  in 
the  development  of  the  figure  of  John  the  Common- 
weal. It  was  natural  that  so  long  a  work,  so  little 
guided  by  rules  of  structure,  should  flag  in  interest 
toward  the  end.  The  play  falls  into  two  parts,  with  an 
intermission  during  which  the  people  were  to  make 
collation.  When  acted  at  Greenside  the  entire  per- 
formance extended  from  nine  in  the  morning  till  six 
o'clock  at  night,  and  the  Cupar  proclamation,  which 
announces  the  beginning  for  seven  o'clock,  suggests 
pointedly  that  the  spectators  "  ordane  us  gude  drink 
agains  ellevin,"  when  the  first  part  should  be  finished. 
Overburdened  though  it  is  with  characters  and  inade- 
quate in  motivation,  a  very  fair  interest  attaches 
nevertheless  to  this  first  part,  which  depicts  the  fall  of 
Rex  Humanitas,  beguiled  by  evil  followers,  under  the 
influence  of  Dame  Sensuality;  the  advancement  of  dis- 
guised Flattery,  Falsehood,  and  Deceit;  the  banish- 
ment of  Good  Counsel;  and  the  imprisonment  of 
Verity  and  Chastity,  together  with  the  final  overthrow 
of  the  evil  powers  upon  the  arrival  of  Divine  Correc- 
tion. The  second  part,  however,  which  contains  the 
author's  boldest  strokes  and  accounts  for  the  name  of 
the  poem,  is  in  all  its  serious  portions  rather  narrative 
than  dramatic,  and  except  here  and  there  makes  flat 
reading.  The  tedious  account  of  the  proceedings  of  the 
Parliament,  with  the  long  story  of  the  wrongs  of  John 
the  Commonweal  and  Pauper,  the  exposition  of  the 
subtle  shifts  of  the  members  of  Spirituality,  and  the 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  93 

final  rehearsal  of  the  fifteen  Parliamentary  acts  form 
dull  matter  in  a  play;  and  the  student  who  arrives 
ultimately  at  the  execution  of  the  three  malefactors 
and  the  escape  of  Flattery  finds  himself  seriously  be- 
fuddled concerning  all  the  dramatic  issues. 

The  most  famous  of  all  interlude  writers  is  John  Hey- 
wood  (?1497-?1580),  who  departed  boldly  from  eYejy 
traditiqn_of  subject  and  treatment,  and  produced  a 
style  of  drama  frankly  satiric  and  amusing  rather  than 
didactic.  Heywood's  plays  are  literary  in  a  sense  in 
which  few  other  interludes  can  be  called  so.  While  ab- 
solutely independent  and  original  in  his  relation  to  na- 
tive dramatic  models,  Heywood  is  almost  reactionary 
m  his  adherence  to  mediaeval  themes,  and  has  been 
shown  to  owe  a  very  considerable  debt  to  the  French 
farce  of  his  day.1  After  discarding  as  uninteresting  or 
plebeian  the  usual  subjects  of  the  English  drama,  he  is 
forced  to  supply  their  place  either  from  abroad  or  from 
what  were  in  his  day  the  only  standard  conventions 
in  secular  English  literature,  —  those  of  Chaucer's 
age. 

The  simplest  of  Heywood's  plays  is  a  mere  debat  in 
riming  couplets,  preserved  in  a  signed  manuscript  of 
the  poet,  and  intended,  as  the  Epilogue  indicates,  for 
presentation  before  the  King  himself.  The  academic 
question  of  the  relative  happiness  of  the  "Witty"  and 
"Witless"  states  is  argued,  first  by  James  and  John, 
then  by  John  and  Jerome.  Only  at  the  end  of  eight 
hundred  lines  of  clever  casuistry  does  the  poet  succeed 
in  proving  the  lot  of  King  Solomon  preferable  to  that 
of  the  court  fool,  Will  Somer. 

1  See  K.  Young,  "The  Influence  of  French  Farce  upon  the  Plays 
of  John  Heywood,"  Modern  Philology,  ii  (1904). 


ny? 


94  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Identical  in  metre1  with  "Witty  and  Witless"  is 
another  dialogue  of  greater  dramatic  merit,  to  which 
Heywood  has  so  far  only  a  conjectural  claim.  "  Gentle- 
ness and  Nobility,"  "  Adyaloge  betwentheMarchaunt, 
the  Knyght,  and  the  plowman,  dysputyng  who  is  a 
verey  Gentylman,"  seems  to  me  in  a  number  of  details 
to  bear  the  marks  of  Heywood's  peculiar  method,  and 
it  undoubtedly  shows  an  advance  upon  that  author's 
"Witty  and  Witless."  Whereas  the  three  disputants 
of  the  latter  piece  are  entirely  unindividualized,  the 
three  speakers  in  "  Gentleness  and  Nobility  "  are  care- 
fully endowed  with  the  contrasted  class  characteristics 
upon  which  Heywood  relies  for  his  main  effect  in  nearly 
all  his  more  developed  dramas,  and  which  he  employs* 
with  especial  cleverness  in  the  "Play  of  the  Weather." 
"Witty  and  Witless"  is  a  rather  dull  composition,  dis- 
playing no  knowledge  of  the  rules  of  stage  action  and 
indicating  a  positive  incapacity  to  deal  with  more  than 
two  of  the  dramatis  persona  at  a  time.  Thus,  one  of 
the  three  figures  is  always  completely  neglected,  while 
Heywood  is  presenting  the  dispute  of  the  other  two. 
The  author  of  "  Gentleness  and  Nobility,"  on  the  con- 
trary, has  a  mastery  of  dramatic  technique,  which 
everywhere  suggests  Heywood's  more  ambitious 
plays.  The  speakers  are  brought  on  and  off  the  stage 
with  perfect  naturalness;  the  interplay  of  speech  and 
action  is  that  of  the  adept  in  arranging  stage  situation; 
and  the  break  in  the  middle  of  the  piece,  necessitated 
by  the  short  patience  of  the  audience,  is  so  managed 
as  to  avoid  every  indication  of  artificiality  or  inco- 
herence. One  has  but  to  compare  the  deliberate  skill 

1  Each  is  written  in  rough  riming  couplets,  with  an  epilogue  in 
rime  royal. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  95 

manifested  in  the  division  of  "Gentleness  and  No- 
bility" with  the  sheer  awkward  amputation  of  Med- 
wall's  "Nature"  in  order  to  realize  the  presence  of  that 
new  artistry  in  plot  manipulation  which  is  generally 
regarded  as  Heywood's  great  contribution  to  Eng- 
lish dramatic  progress. 

Heywood's  authorship  of  "  Gentleness  and  Nobility  " 
is  rendered  the  more  probable  by  a  relationship  which 
seems  not  hitherto  to  have  been  noted.  Like  "The 
Pardoner  and  the  Friar"  and  "The  Four  P's,"  and 
unlike  any  other  known  drama  of  this  epoch,  "  Gentle- 
ness and  Nobility"  is  marked  by  a  very  close  imitation  ^ 
of  the  work  of  Chaucer.  The  entire  moral  of  the  piece 
is  taken  from  the  Wife  of  Bath's  Tale,  and  the  specific 
verbal  plagiarism  in  several  passages  is  hardly  less 
striking  than  that  manifested  in  the  two  accepted 
works  just  mentioned.1 

In  the  "Play  of  Love,"  Heywood  harks  back  to  the 
old  subtleties  and  refinements  of  the  courts  of  love. 
The  four  characters  are  thus  named:  The  Lover  not  Be- 
loved, The  Woman  Beloved  not  Loving,  The  Lover 
Beloved,  Neither  Lover  nor  Loved.  The  last  figure, 
who  is  elsewhere  termed  the  "vyse,"  gives  the  play  all 
the  little  liveliness  it  possesses.  The  contents  can  well 
be  imagined.  They  may  in  Heywood's  time  have 
amused  an  audience  of  fine  ladies  and  court  gallants,  as 
they  would  certainly  have  been  more  likely  to  do  two 
centuries  earlier,  but  there  is  little  reason  why  a  stu- 
dent of  the  drama  should  linger  over  so  patent  an 
anachronism. 

The  most  carefully  worked  out  of  Heywood's  plays, 
and  the  most  original,  is  the  "new  and  very  merry  in- 

1  See,  further,  my  article  in  Modern  Language  Review,  1911. 


96  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

terlude  of  all  manner  weathers,"  devised,  probably,  in 
flattery  of  Henry  VIII.1  Instead  of  the  three  or  four 
characters  in  his  other  works,  Heywood  here  intro- 
duces ten,  all  of  whom  are  on  the  stage  simultane- 
ously in  the  concluding  scene.  The  dramatis  persona 
embrace  Jupiter,  the  all-wise  and  affable  sovereign; 
Merry  Report,  the  vice,  whose  genially  comic  figure 
has  lost  all  savor  of  the  fire  and  brimstone  originally 
attaching  to  it;  and  a  collection  from  the  different 
types  of  humanity;  a  gentleman,  a  merchant,  a  forest- 
ranger,  a  water-miller,  a  wind-miller,  a  gentlewoman,  a 
laundress,  and  a  boy  "the  least  that  can  play."  This 
motley  assemblage  is  brought  together  by  a  proclama- 
tion of  Jupiter,  desirous  once  for  all  to  settle  mundane 
meteorology,  that  all  persons  interested  in  the  weather 
should  declare  their  preferences.  The  clash  of  conflict- 
ing interests  is  amusingly  depicted.  The  gentleman 
thinks  of  his  hunting,  the  merchant  of  his  sailing  ves- 
sels, the  forester  of  his  windfall  perquisites,  the  water- 
miller  and  the  wind-miller  have  high  words  over  the 
need  of  rain  and  wind  respectively.  The  gentlewoman, 
anxious  for  her  complexion,  finds  herself  at  odds  with 
the  laundress,  who  clamors  for  hot  sunshine;  and  the 
small  boy  comes  in  as  emissary  from  his  fellows  to  de- 
mand unlimited  snow-balling.  Jupiter  reconciles  the 
contending  suitors  and  makes  clear  to  the  audience 
the  supreme  wisdom  of  his  own  arrangements. 

In  the  plays  of  "Love"  and  "Weather"  it  is  possible 
to  discern  the  vague  influence  of  the  morality  in  the 
"vice,"  who  still  remains,  though  greatly  altered  and 
humanized.  In  the  other  interludes  of  Heywood  even 

1  Concerning  the  source,  see  J.  Q.  Adams,  Mod.  Lang.  Notet, 
1907,  262. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  97 

this  resemblance  disappears,  and  the  reader  finds  him- 
self conveyed  back  by  subject-matter  and  spirit  of 
treatment  to  Chaucer  and  fourteenth-century  realism; 
while  in  dramatic  method  he  is  being  carried  forward 
—  thanks  to  the  poet's  individual  genius  and  to  his 
imitation  of  the  French  —  to  a  plane  of  technical  skill 
and  conscious  art  considerably  higher  than  that  at- 
tained by  any  of  Hey  wood's  contemporaries.  In  "The 
Pardoner  and  the  Friar,"  the  "Mery  Play  between 
JohanJohan  the  husbande,Tyb  hiswyfe.and  syr  Jhan 
the  preest,"  and  the  famous  "Four  P's,"  there  is  no- 
thing which  suggests  either  the  ancient  morality  play 
or  the  religious  and  social  conditions  of  Heywood's 
time.  Doubtless  Heywood,  in  whom  the  controversial-  . 
ist  seems  to  have  been  submerged  in  the  entertainer, 
and  whose  sympathies  lay  certainly  with  the  less 
aggressive  papal  party  in  the  Reformation  conflict, 
found  it  safer  and  pleasanter  to  avoid  the  burning 
questions  of  theological  dispute,  so  fully  treated  by 
Bale,  and  to  restrict  himself  to  trite  and  harmless 
themes  such  as  the  impostures  of  pardoners,  friars,  and 
palmers,  or  the  amorous  lapses  of  the  parish  clergy. 
Page  after  page  in  these  dramas  is  plagiarized  from  the 
"  Canterbury  Tales."  There  is  nowhere  a  turn  of  thought 
or  plot  unfamiliar  to  readers  of  Boccaccio  and  Chaucer; 
but  Heywood  makes  up  for  the  uninventive  archaism 
of  his  subject  by  progressiveness  in  presentation.  In 
his  interludes  English  realistic  comedy  attains  full 
growth.1  The  mustard  seed  of  buffoonery,  found  almost 

1  The  most  interesting  survival  of  the  particular  type  of  interlude 
evolved  by  Heywood  in  John  John  is  probably  the  play  of  Tom  Tyler 
and  his  Wife,  which  exists  only  in  a  "second  impression,"  dated 
1CG1.  As  the  final  prayer  for  the  "noble  Queen"  shows,  the  work 


98  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

by  accident  in  the  mystery  and  the  early  morality,  has 
completely  choked  the  more  serious  matter.  Comedy 
required  at  this  period,  not  stimulation,  but  refine- 
ment, —  deepening  and  idealization.  These  elements 
were  added  in  time,  but  they  were  not  to  be  found  in 
native  drama,  and  their  gradual  introduction  mani- 
fests itself  in  a  number  of  hybrid  productions,  which 
begin  as  mere  expressions  of  the  playwright's  craving 
for  greater  variety  of  subject,  and  end  by  bridging  the 
chasm  between  the  incoherent  native  interlude  and  the 
largely  exotic  and  thoroughly  self-conscious,  but  still 
essentially  national  comedy  of  Elizabeth's  reign. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I.  INTERLUDES  REFLECTING  THE  EDUCATIONAL  INTERESTS  OF 

THE  RENAISSANCE 

MEDWALL,  H.  :  Nature.  Undated  edition  (copy  in  British  Mu- 
seum). Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  A.  Brandl, 
Quellen  u.  Forschungen,  80, 1898  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  "  Lost "  Tudor 
Plays,  1907.  Fragment  of  early  edition  facsimiled  Materialien, 
Bd.  xii.  A  third  fragment  in  Bodleian  (Rawlinson,  40, 598, 12). 
A  lost  Interlude  by  "  Mayster  Midwell,"  "  of  the  fyndyng 
of  Troth  "  acted  at  Richmond,  Christmas,  1514-15.  Cf .  Col- 
lier, i,  69.  ["  A  godely  interlude  of  Fulgeus,  Cenatoure  of 
Rome,  Lucres  his  doughter,  Gayus  Flaininius  and  Publius 
Cornelius,  of  the  Disputacyon  of  Noblenes,"  said  by  Halli- 
well-Phillipps  (Outlines,  10  ed.  ii,  340)  to  have  been  written 

must  date  from  before  the  death  of  Elizabeth,  and  it  is  probable  that 
it  belongs  to  an  even  earlier  period.  Tom  Tyler  combines  a  reminis- 
cence of  the  morality  convention  in  "Desire,  the  Vice"  and  the  "sage 
Parsons,"  Destiny  and  Patience,  with  a  very  Heywoodian  farcical 
plot  of  village  types.  Evidently,  however,  the  genuine  dramatic 
interest  in  this  piece  was  subordinate  to  the  operatic  appeal  of  the 
seven  long  songs  which  the  author  manages  to  introduce  within  the 
small  compass  of  nine  hundred  lines. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  99 

about  1490  by  Medwall  and  printed  by  Kastell.    Not  known 

to  exist,  unless  in   a  fragment  of  two  leaves  (B.  M.,  Hurl. 

5919,  f .  20,  98VRepr.  Malone  Soc.  "  Collections,"  I,  ii,  1909, 

137-142.]   - 
RASTELL,  JOHN  :  The  Nature  of  the  Four  Elements.  Facsim- 

ile, J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.    Reprinted,  J.  O.  Halliwell,  1847  ; 

Hazlitt's  Dodsley,  vol.  i,  1874 ;  Julius  Fisher,  Marburg,  1903. 
RKDFORD,  JOHN  :  Wit  and  Science.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer, 

1908.    Printed,  J.  O.  Halliwell,   Shakespeare  Society,  1848  ; 

J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  "  Lost "  Tudor 

T^ays,  1907.    Discussion :  J.  Seifert,  "  Wit  und  Science  —  Mo- 

ralitilten,"  Prague,  1892. 
Marriage  of  Wit  and  Science.  Printed  by  Thomas  Marche, 

n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1909.  Reprinted,  Hazlitt's  Dod$- 

ley,  ii,  1874. 
MKKBURY,  FRANCIS  :  The  Marriage  of  Wit  and  'Wisdom. 

MS.  dated  1579.  Facsimile,  Farmer,  1909.  Printed,  J.  O.  Halli- 

well, Shakespeare  Society,  1846. 

II.  INTERLUDES  ILLUSTRATING  THE  TUDOR  MODIFICATION  OF 

THE    "  FULL-SCOPE    MORALITY  " 

The  World  and  the  Child  (Mundus  et  Infans).  Printed, 
Wynkyn  de  Worde,  1522.  Facsimile,  Farmer,  1909.  Reprinted, 
Roxburghe  Club,  1817  ;  Collier,  Dodsley,  xii  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  i, 
1874  ;  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897.  Discussion :  II.  N.  Mac- 
Cracken,  "  A  Source  of  Mundus  et  Infans,"  PubL  Mod.  Lang. 
Assoc.,  23,  486-496. 

Hickscorner.    Printed,  Wynkyn  de  Worde,   n.  d.  Facsimile, 
Farmer,  1908.  2d  ed.  J.  Waley.  Reprinted,  Hawkins,  i,  1773  ; 
Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  \,  1874  ;  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897. 
Youth,  Interlude  of.  Three  early  editions:  — 

(a)  Fragment  of  4  leaves  at  Lambeth  Palace  (printed  by 

W.  de  Worde  ?) 
(6)  "The  Enterlude   of  Tooth"  (c.  1560),  Wm.  Copland. 

Copy  in  B.  M. 

(c)  "  The  nterlude  of  Youth  "  (c.  1557),  J.  Waley.  Copy  in  B. 
M.  Facsimile  of  (6),  Farmer,  1908  ;  of  (a)  and  (c),  1900. 
Reprinted,  Hazlitt.  Dodsley,  ii,  1874;  W.  Bang  and  R.  B. 
McKerrow,  Materialien,  xii,  1905;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Six 
Anon.  Plays  ('-d  Series),  1'JOG. 


100  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

WEVER,  R. :  Lusty  Juventus.  Three  early  editions  are 
known:  — 

(a)  Printed  by  W.  Copland.     Copy  in  B.  M. 
(6)         "       "    A.  Vele.  Copy  in  the  Bodleian, 

(c)         "        "    J.  Awdely.       Copy  in  B.  M.  n.  d. 
Facsimile  of  (c),  Farmer,  1907.  Reprinted,  Hawkins,  i,  1773; 
Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ii,  1874;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Dramatic   Writings 
ofR.  Wever  and  Th.  Ingelend,  1905. 

III.  INTERLUDES  OF  POLITICAL  PURPOSE 

SKELTON,  JOHN  :  Magnificence,  n.  d.  Reprinted,  J.  Littledale, 
RoxburgTie  Club,  1821  ;  A.  Dyce,  Poetical  Works  of  Skelton, 
1843,  vol.  i ;  R.  L.  Ramsay,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1908  for  1906.  (Lost 
Plays  of  Skelton :  Nigramansir,  cf .  Warton,  History  of  Eng. 
Poetry,  ed.  1871,  iii,  287  ;  Interlude  of  Virtue,  and  Comedy 
Achademios  mentioned  in  Skelton's  "  Garlande  of  Law- 
rell.") 

LINDSAY,  SIR  DAVID  :  Satire  of  the  Three  Estates.  Text 
preserved  in 
(a)  Bannatyne  MS.,  1568.  Selected  comic  portions.  Ed.  Hun- 

terian  Club  — 
(&)  Printed,  Robert  Charteris,  Edinburgh,  1602.    Complete, 

except  for  Cupar  of  Fife  "  Proclamation." 
Reprinted  in  Lindsay's  Works,  ed.  Chalmers,  1806  ;  ed.  D. 
Laing,  1879  ;  ed.  F.  Hall,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1869. 

Respublica.  MS.  1553.  Facsimile,  Farmer,  1908.  Printed,  J.  P. 
Collier,  Illustrations  of  Old  English  Literature,  i,  1866  ;  A 
Brandl,  Quellen,  1898  ;  L.  A.  Magnus,  E.  E.  T.  S.,  1905  ; 
J.  S.  Farmer,  "  Lost "  Tudor  Plays,  1907. 

[To  this  class  probably  belonged  the  lost  play  by  John  Roo,  acted 
at  Gray's  Inn,  Christmas,  1527-28,  which  treated  the  separa- 
tion of  Lord  Governannce  and  Lady  Pnblike-wele  by  means 
of  Dissipation  and  Negligence.  Cf.  Hall's  account,  quoted 
by  Collier,  vol.  i,  103.] 

IV.  INTERLUDES  OF  RELIGIOUS  CONTROVERSY 

BALE,  JOHN  :  Dramatic  Writings,  ed.  J.  S.  Farmer,  1907. 

God's  Promises.  Two  early  editions  known  :  —  (a)  ed.  with- 
out date  ;  (b)  1577.  Facsimile,  of  (a),  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908. 


THE  TUDOR  INTERLUDE  101 

Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  editions  ;  Everyman  and  other  Inter- 
ludes, 1909. 

John  Baptist  Preaching  in  the  Wilderness.  Ed.,  n.  d. 
Reprinted,  Harleian  Miscellany,  i,  97,  1744;  2d  ed.,  1808,  i, 
101. 

The  Temptation  of  Our  Lord.  Ed.,  n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1909.  Reprinted,  A.  B.  Grosart,  Mite,  of  Fuller's 
Worthies  Library,  i,  1870. 

The  Three  Laws.  Two  early  editions  are  known:  — 

(a)  n.  d.  ("  per  Nicolauui  Bamburgeiisem  ")  Facsimile,  J.  S. 

Farmer,  1908. 

(b)  1562,  printed  for  Th.  Col  well,  (a)  Reprinted,  A.  Schroeer, 


L  tx^Anglia,  v  (1882). 
Jol 


John,  King  of  England.  MS.,  Chataworth.  Facsimile ,  Mate- 
rialien,  MV,  1909.  Printed,  J.  P.  Collier,  Camden  Society, 
1838 ;  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897. 

New  Custom.  Ed.  1573.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.  Re- 
printed, Dodsley  (Reed  &  Collier,  vol.  i;  Hazlitt,  vol.  iii). 

Robin  Conscience.  Reprinted,  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Early  Popular 
Poetry,  iii. 

John  Bon  and  Mast  Parson.  Printed  by  John  Day  and 
Wm.  Seres,  n.  d.  Reprinted,  J.  Smeeton,  W.  H.  Black,  Percy 
Society,  xrr,  1852. 

[To  this  class  seem  to  have  belonged  also  the  four  plays  men- 
tioned as  his  own  by  Thomas  Wylley  :  "  A  Reverent  Re- 
ceiving of  the  Sacrament,"  "A  Rude  Commonalty,"  "The 
Woman  on  the  Rock,"  and  a  play  against  the  "  Pope's  Coun- 
sellors." Cf.  Wylley's  letter  to  Cromwell,  quoted  by  Collier, 
i,  129,  130.] 

V.  INTERLUDES  INTENDED  FOB  AMUSEMENT  ONLY 

HEYWOOD,  JOHN  :  Dramatic  Writings,  ed.  J.  S.  Farmer,  1905. 
The  Play  of  Love.  Two  early  editions  are  known  :  — 

(a)  Ed.  1534.    Copy  in   Magdalene  College,  Cambridge. 

Wm.  Rastell. 

(6)  Incomplete  copy  in  the  Bodleian.  John  Waley.  Facsimile 
of  (b),  J.  S.  Farmer,  1909.  (6)  Reprinted,  Brand  I, 
Quellen,  1898.  Discussion:  W.  W.  Greg,  Archiv,  KMi 
(1901),  141-113. 


102  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Play  of  the  Weather.  Two  early  editions  :  — 

(a)  Ed.  1533.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Fanner,  1909.  Wm.  Rastell. 
(6)  Ed.  1565  ?  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.  Anthony 
Kytsou.  Reprinted,  A.  Braudl,  Quellen,  1898;  A.  W.  Pollard, 
Representative  English  Comedies,  1903.  Discussion :  F.  Holt- 
hausen, "  Zu  John  Hey  wood's  Wetterspiel,"  Herrig's  A  rchiv, 
116  (1906),  pp.  103,  104  ;  J.  Q.  Adams,  "John  Hey  wood's 
Play  of  the  Weather,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  22,  1907. 
The  Pardoner  and  the  Friar.  Printed,  Wm.  Rastell,  1533. 
Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1909.  Reprinted,  F.  J.  Child,  Four 
Old  Plays,  Cambridge,  U.  S.  A.,  1848  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  i, 
1874. 

John  John  the  Husband,  Tyb  his  Wife,  and  Sir  John 
the  Priest.  Ed.  1533-34.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Fanner,  1909. 
Reprinted,  Chiswick  Press,  1819 ;  Brandl,  Quellen,  1898  ; 
A.  W.  Pollard,  Representative  English  Comedies,  1903 ;  J.  S. 
Farmer,  Two  Tudor  Shrew  Plays,  1908. 

The  Four  P's.  Three  early  editions  :  (a)  Printed  by  Wm. 
Myddleton  ;  (i)  Wm.  Copland  ;  (c)  John  Allde,  1569.  Fac- 
simile of  (a),  Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  edi- 
tions ;  W.  Scott,  Ancient  British  Drama,  1810,  vol.  i ;  Manly, 
Specimens,  i,  1897. 

"Witty  and  Witless.  MS.,  signed  by  Heywood.  Facsimile, 
J.  S.  Farmer,  1909.  Printed,  F.  W.  Fairholt,  Percy  Society, 
xx,  1846  (abridg.  ed.). 

General  Discussion  of  Heywood :  Wilhelm  Swoboda,  "John  Hey- 
wood als  Dramatiker,"  Wiener  Beitrdge,  1888  ;  Karl  Young, 
"  Influence  of  French  Farce  upon  the  plays  of  John  Heywood," 
Mod.  Phil.,  ii  (1904)  ;  W.  Bang,  "  Acta  Anglo-Lovaniensia. 
John  Heywood  und  sein  Kreis."  Engl.  Stud.,  38  (1907),  234- 
245. 

Of  Gentleness  and  Nobility.  Two  parts.  Printed,  without 
date,  by  John  Rastell.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted, 
J.  H.  Burn,  1829  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Early  English  Dramatists,  1908. 
Tom  Tyler  and  His  Wife.  "  An  Excellent  Old  Play,  as  It  was 
Printed  and  Acted  about  a  hundred  Years  ago.  .  .  .  The  sec- 
ond Impression.  London,  Printed  in  the  Year,  1661."  Re- 
printed, F.  E.  Schelling,  Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.,  xv  (1900)  ; 
J.  S.  Farmer,  Six  Anonymous  Plays  (2d  Series),  1906  ;  Malone 
Society,  1910. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION 

AT  a  period  roughly  synchronizing  with  the  commence- 
ment of  Queen  Elizabeth's  reign  (1558)  and  the  birth 
of  Shakespeare  (1564),  the  native  interlude  began  to  be 
supplanted  as  the  fashionable  and  progressive  type  of 
drama  by  plays  of  different  character  and  for  the  most 
part  of  foreign  origin.  But  the  interlude  was  much 
too  deep-rooted  either  to  be  discarded  at  once  or  to 
be  easily  merged  in  the  newer  forms.  Plays  of  allegori- 
cal content  deriving  immediately  from  the  morality 
remain  common  till  the  accession  of  James  I,  while  in 
Thomas  Nabbes's  "  Microcosmos "  (1634)  the  species 
crops  up  again  very  near  the  end  of  the  Caroline 
era. 

Most  of  these  late  interludes  are  intrinsically  dull. 
The  shift  in  popular  dramatic  interest  deprived  them 
of  the  opportunity  for  natural  evolution;  they  merely 
repeat  the  old  stock  incidents  and  devices,  and  there 
is  no  longer  any  jauntiness  in  their  plagiarism.  The 
poverty  in  content  and  lack  of  resourcefulness  natural 
to  the  entire  morality  species  appear  nowhere  more 
glaringly  than  in  these  last  survivals  of  the  type.  Such 
threadbare  motives  as  the  quarrels  of  vices  and  virtues 
or  the  masquerading  of  vice  under  the  cloak  of  virtue 
are  retained  for  mere  convention's  sake,  sometimes  to 
the  positive  detriment  of  the  action  and  sense.  How- 
ever uninteresting  in  itself,  the  decadent  interlude  is 
yet  the  necessary  object  of  study  for  all  who  would 


104  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

trace  the  rise  of  the  popular  Elizabethan  drama.  In 
it  is  manifested  that  gradual  blending  of  moribund 
native  convention  with  foreign  importation  and  rash 
experiment,  through  which  was  finally  consummated 
the  art  form  of  Shakespeare  and  his  fellows,  —  a  form 
thoroughly  national,  on  the  one  hand,  and  in  the  best 
sense  conservative,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  it  lent 
itself  to  the  freest  extension  of  range  and  the  freshest 
treatment  of  new  themes. 

The  systematic  classification  of  the  transitional  in- 
terludes is  a  work  of  impossibility,  for  the  extant  speci- 
mens display  neither  continuity  of  type  nor,  very 
often,  any  trace  of  literary  consciousness.  They  arose 
during  a  period  which  had  largely  given  up  the  old 
canons  of  criticism,  and  had  not  yet  attained  to  new 
ones,  and  they  are  almost  exclusively  the  production  of 
amateurs,  —  spontaneous  off-shoots  from  the  ancient 
dramatic  stock,  affected  in  every  conceivable  degree 
and  manner  by  the  new  features  which  the  more  de- 
liberate dramatists  were  busied  in  grafting  upon  it. 

The  lately  recovered  play  of  "John  the  Evangelist" 
is  probably  an  early  example  of  the  transitional  ten- 
dency in  the  interlude.1  Though  the  work  belongs  for- 
mally to  the  old  species  of  moral  allegory,  there  is  no 
real  purpose  either  in  the  symbolism  or  in  the  religious 

1  John  the  Evangelist  has  not  been  satisfactorily  dated.  The  activ- 
ities of  the  printer  of  the  extant  edition,  John  Waley,  seem  to  have 
extended  from  1546  to  1586.  Eugenie's  speech,  "By  my  fayth  ye 
shall  be  hangeman  of  Calys,"  points  to  a  date  previous  to  the  loss  of 
Calais  in  1558,  and  the  general  style  of  the  piece  likewise  indicates 
the  reign  of  Mary  as  the  latest  possible  period  of  composition.  It  is 
perhaps  hazardous  to  accept  the  entry  —  "1  saint  jon  euuangeliste 
en  trelute  [?  enterlude]"  in  the  Day  Rook  of  John  Dome  as  proving 
this  play's  existence  in  1520.  See  Malone  Soc.  ed. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         105 

teaching.  Of  the  six  speakers  —  St.  John,  Eugenio, 
Irisdision,  Actio,  Evil  Counsel,  and  Idleness  —  only 
the  last  three  are  in  any  true  sense  allegorical,  and  their 
function  is  almost  purely  comic.  There  exists  hardly 
a  trace  of  plot  or  dramatic  action.  Evil  Counsel  and 
Idleness  have  nothing  to  do  with  any  of  the  other  char- 
acters. They  come  in  like  clowns  in  a  variety  show,  to 
regale  the  audience  with  a  comic  dialogue  and  the  nar- 
ration of  various  farcical  experiences,  and  go  out,  not 
to  reappear.  Eugenio  and  Actio  behave  indecorously 
in  the  earlier  part  of  the  play  and  repent  at  the  close  of 
St.  John's  discourse,  but  they  stand  for  no  particular 
vices,  and  are  not  in  any  special  degree  antagonists  of 
the  good  characters,  who  themselves  are  so  little  differ- 
entiated as  to  leave  room  for  doubt  whether  the  author 
intended  to  represent  in  St.  John  and  Irisdision  two 
persons  or  one.1 

In  the  absence  of  any  definite  knowledge  concerning 
the  sources  of  this  drama,  it  is  not  easy  to  conjecture 
what  can  have  suggested  to  the  poet  the  names  John 
the  Evangelist,  Irisdision,  and  Eugenio.  The  last  is 
particularly  striking  as  an  apparent  indication  of  the 
tendency  to  replace  symbolic  appellations  by  concrete 
names  drawn  from  history  or  romance.  However, 
Eugenie's  character  fails  to  justify  the  romantic  pro- 
mise of  his  name.  He  is  but  a  weak  variation  of  the 
usual  type  of  vicious  youth,  who,  though  able  to  scoff 
feebly  at  the  pious  Irisdision,  is  in  the  end  so  much  dis- 
quieted by  that  sage's  lurid  picture  of  the  dangers  of 
the  primrose  path  of  dalliance  as  to  require  much 

1  Cf.  H.  Bradley,  Mod.  Lang.  Review,  July,  1907;  W.  H.  Wil- 
liams, "  Irisdision  in  the  Interlude  of  Johan  the  Euangelyst,"  Mod. 
Lang.  Review,  July,  1908. 


106  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

encouragement  from  Actio  before  he  can  betake  him- 
self with  any  zest  to  vicious  courses. 

It  is  noticeable  that  this  play,  which  would  seem  to 
have  been  composed  by  a  mild  supporter  of  the  old 
religion,  is  as  far  from  championing  any  sectarian  be- 
lief as  it  is  from  pointing  a  specific  moral.  Whether 
from  excess  of  prudence  or  lack  of  originality,  the  au- 
thor expresses  his  conceptions  of  good  and  evil  with  a 
truly  mediaeval  vagueness.  The  way  to  the  Castle  of 
Zion  passes,  according  to  Irisdision,  over  the  mead  of 
meekness  to  the  path  of  patience,  thence  to  the  lawn 
of  largeness,  and  the  lane  of  business;  while  the  "via 
obliqua  "  leads  to  death  and  the  lady  of  confusion,  who 
is  called  Babylon.  The  description  of  the  isle  of  sin  is 
so  thoroughly  in  the  tone  of  Langland  and  the  four- 
teenth century  that  it  is  difficult  to  believe  the  play  a 
genuine  product  of  the  Reformation  epoch :  — 

"With  bowes  and  trees  it  is  meruaylously  paled. 
There  groweth  the  elders  of  enuye 
Staked  with  pryde  full  hye. 

And  the  breres  of  bakbytyng  with  wrath  wrethed  aboute 
Full  of  slouthy  busshes  and  lecherous  thornes  drye, 
With  glotonous  postes  and  couetyse  rayled  throughoute. 
And  at  myscheues  gate  many  dothe  in  ronne." 

A  considerable  group  of  interludes,  extending 
throughout  the  entire  reign  of  Elizabeth,  deal  with 
problems  arising  out  of  fluctuations  in  fortune.  Several 
of  these,  like  the  earlier  "Magnificence"  and  "Respub- 
lica,"  have,  besides  their  economic  interest,  a  more  or 
less  distinct  political  bias.  Such  is  the  play  of  "Wealth 
and  Health,"  entered  on  the  Stationers'  Register,  July 
19,  1557,  though  the  concluding  prayer  for  Queen 
Elizabeth  shows  that  the  extant  edition  cannot  be 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        107 

earlier  than  November  17,  1558.    The  plot  narrates 
ramblingly  and  somewhat  confusedly  the  misfortunes 
of  Wealth,  Health,  and  Liberty,  the  three  glories  of  the 
English  nation,  at  the  hands  of  the  vices,  111  Will  and 
Shrewd  Wit,  who  by  means  of  "waste  and  war"  bring 
them  to  destitution,  disease,  and  captivity,  till  in  the 
end  they  are  relieved  by  Good  Remedy.    A  seventh 
member  of  the  dramatis  persona  is  of  much  importance. 
Hans  Beerpot,  the  drunken  Fleming,  though  occasion- 
ally referred  to  as  typifying  War,  is  a  concrete  person- 
age who  cuts  a  rather  surprising  figure  among  the  ab- 
stractions of  the  piece.  He  is  brought  upon  the  stage 
soliciting  in  an  impossible  Dutch  jargon  the  post  of 
cannoneer,  and  is  heartily  reviled  by  all  the  other 
speakers,  good  and  bad.    Ultimately  he  gets  his  dis- 
missal from  Good  Remedy,  who  accuses  him  of  spiriting 
away  Englishmen's  wealth  to  Flanders  by  means  of 
war.   "There  is  too  many  aliants  in  this  realm,"  says 
Good  Remedy  pointedly,  and  concludes,  regardless  of 
Hans's  protestations  of  love  for  the  English:  " Get  thee 
hence,  drunken  Fleming!  Thou  shalt  tarry  no  longer 
here."    The  satire  of  the  play  seems  to  be  directed 
specifically  against  the  very  unpopular  and  expensive 
war  in  Flanders  during  the  year  previous  to  Mary's 
death  (1557-1558).    But  back  of  the  allegorical  signifi- 
cance of  Hans,  who  as  Flemish  War  causes  the  dissipa- 
tion of  English  Wealth,  there  lies  a  more  general  satire 
upon  the  pushing  and  deceitful  alien,  —  a  class  exces- 
sively hated  during  the  entire  Tudor  period.   In  this 
attack  there  is  nothing  allegorical  or  symbolic.    The 
swaggering  foreigner  who  oppresses  native  merit  was 
one  of  the  commonest  butts  of  the  realistic  comedy. 
The  first  two  acts  of  " Sir  Thomas  More"  represent  the 


108  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

rising  against  the  Lombards  on  111  May  Day,  and  out- 
breaks against  the  Flemings  themselves  were  certainly 
no  less  violent  during  Elizabeth's  reign  than  in  the  time 
of  Chaucer,  when  "Jakke  Straw  and  his  meynee,"  as 
that  poet  tells  us  ("Nun's  Priest's  Tale,"  11.  575-577) 
"wolden  any  Fleming  kille." 

That  the  figure  of  Hans  was  successful  is  shown 
by  the  reappearance  of  the  character,  supported  by  a 
duplicate,  Philip  Fleming,  in  Ulpian  Fulwell's  "Like 
Will  to  Like,"  first  printed  in  1568.  This  last  produc- 
tion, entitled  in  full  "Like  Will  to  Like,  Quod  the 
Devil  to  the  Collier,"  is  on  several  accounts  one  of  the 
most  striking  of  the  later  interludes,  and  would  seem 
to  be  solely  responsible  for  several  generalizations  of 
modern  writers  about  the  type.  It  shows  the  morality 
stuff  already  half  absorbed  in  realistic  comedy,  and  it 
attests  in  its  author  both  a  considerable  skill  in  the 
production  of  stage  effect  and  a  colossal  effrontery  in 
plagiarism.  The  sixteen  characters  are  pretty  equally 
divided  between  moral  abstractions  like  Virtuous  Life, 
God's  Promise,  and  Good  Fame,  and  low  comic  types 
such  as  Tom  Tosspot,  Ralph  Roister,  Pierce  Pick- 
purse,1  and  Tom  Collier.  The  vice  of  this  play,  Nichol 
Newfangle,  is  the  most  imposing  of  his  class.  He  rallies 
the  audience  with  all  the  assurance  of  a  star  comedian, 
and  patronizes  Lucifer  himself.  He  compasses  a  good 
deal  of  petty  knavery,  and  suffers  at  least  partial 
retribution  from  two  of  his  dupes;  but  he  manifests 
throughout  all  the  aplomb  of  Autolycus,  whom,  indeed, 
he  much  resembles  when  he  comes  upon  the  stage  with 

1  For  an  explanation  of  the  pun  implied  in  this  name,  where 
Pierce  is  to  be  pronounced  "Purse,"  see  H.  N.  MacCracken,  New 
York  Nation,  86  (1908),  146. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         109 

"a  bag,  a  staff,  a  bottle,  and  two  halters,  going  about 
the  place,  showing  it  unto  the  audience,"  and  singing, 
"Trim  merchandise,  trim,  trim;  trim  merchandise, 
trim,  trim."  And  finally,  no  whit  dismayed,  he  takes  his 
leave  of  the  spectators,  and  rides  off  to  hell,  like  his  imi- 
tator in  Greene's  "Friar  Bacon,"  on  the  devil's  back. 

Another  play,  dealing,  like  "Wealth  and  Health," 
with  changes  of  fortune,  is  the  "Newe  Interlude  of 
Impacyente  Pouerte,"  newly  imprinted  in  1560  by 
John  King,  where  the  titular  hero,  entering  very  "  im- 
patient" and  unmannerly  indeed,  is  reformed  into 
Prosperity  by  the  virtue  Peace.  Later,  however,  he  is 
beguiled  by  Envy,  disguised  as  Charity,  and  Misrule 
in  the  garb  of  Mirth,  and  is  by  them  delivered  over  to 
Colhazard,  the  gambler,  who  rooks  him  of  two  thou- 
sand pounds.  The  metamorphosis  back  to  Poverty 
thus  easily  accomplished,  the  hero  is  deserted  by  his  de- 
ceivers and  left  to  the  harsh  usage  of  a  very  Chaucerian 
Sumner,  only  vaguely  identified  with  the  abstraction 
Falsehood,  from  whom  Peace  at  length  delivers  him. 

To  this  same  dramatic  class,  and  to  the  same  period, 
belongs  apparently  the  play  of  "Albion  Knight,"  li- 
censed to  Thomas  Colwell  in  1565-1566.  This  piece, 
which  is  known,  unfortunately,  only  from  a  single 
fragment  containing  six  leaves  out  of  the  earlier  por- 
tion, dealt  to  an  even  greater  extent  than  "Wealth  and 
Health"  with  political  matters.  The  extant  lines  are 
mainly  concerned  with  the  elaboration  of  a  plot 
whereby  the  vices,  Injury  and  Division,  hope  to  sepa- 
rate Albion  from  Justice,  and  prevent  his  marriage 
with  "fayre  dame  plentie,"  the  daughter  of  Peace. 

The  contemporary  "Trial  of  Treasure,"  printed  in 
1567,  is  one  of  the  most  inconsequential  of  Tudor 


110  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

dramas.  The  title  has  little  appropriateness,  for 
Treasure  appears  only  in  the  last  third  of  the  work,  and 
is  never  brought  to  actual  trial.  The  play  seems  lack- 
ing in  plot  and  purpose,  possibly  because  the  key  to  its 
topical  or  political  allusions  has  been  lost;  but  it  con- 
tains some  excellent  snatches  of  song  and  several  strik- 
ing situations.  Such,  for  example,  are  the  spirited 
wrestling  match  between  Lust  and  Just,  and  the 
shackling  of  the  vice,  Inclination,  whom  the  redoubt- 
able Just  leads  forward  in  the  final  scene,  bridled  like 
Tamburlaine's  "pampered  jades  of  Asia." 

The  most  conspicuous  feature  of  the  last  interludes 
is  their  pronounced  tendency,  when  free  from  outside 
influence,  to  revert  to  the  general  form  and  tone  of  the 
early  morality.  As  the  species  lost  its  hold  upon  the 
fashionable  public,  it  passed  naturally  out  of  the  hands 
of  non-moral,  professional  entertainers  like  Heywood 
into  those  of  unprogressive,  leisurely  poetasters,  who 
appear  to  have  belonged  largely  to  the  clerical  profes- 
sion, and  whose  object  was  more  frequently  edification 
than  amusement.  Thus,  the  artificial  conditions  which 
produced  the  compression,  simplicity,  and  wit  of  the 
interlude  of  Henry  VIII 's  "reign  were  removed,  and 
there  resulted  during  the  early  years  of  Elizabeth  a 
very  marked  relapse  toward  the  tedious  rambling 
structure,  multiplicity  of  characters,  and  large  homi- 
letic  infusion  which  belong  to  fifteenth-century  works 
like  "The  Castle  of  Perseverance,"  "The  Conversion 
of  Mary  Magdalene,"  "Wisdom,"  and  "Nature." 
This  change  was,  of  course,  an  evidence  of  decay.  The 
expansion  of  the  Heywoodian  norm  of  eight  or  nine 
hundred  lines  and  four  or  five  well  -  individualized 
figures  into  long,  slow-moving  works,  averaging  two 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        111 

thousand  lines  and  employing  from  fifteen  to  forty 
characters,  was  but  a  process  of  fatty  degeneration 
which  accompanied  the  loss  of  sinew  and  vitality. 

Four  excellent  examples  of  this  last  phase  of  the 
strict  moral  play  are  preserved  from  the  first  quarter 
of  Elizabeth's  reign:  Lewis  Wager's  "Life  and  Repent- 
ance of  Marie  Magdalene,"  1566;  George  Wapull's 
"Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man,"  1576;  T.  Lupton's  "All  for 
Money,"  1578;  and  an  undated  work  of  the  same  period 
by  W.  Wager,  "The  Longer  Thou  Li  vest  the  More  Fool 
Thou  Art."  In  all  these  compositions  one  misses  en- 
tirely the  dramatic  skill  and  high  evolutionary  possi- 
bilities of  the  secularized,  abbreviated  interludes  of 
the  previous  half-century,  while  one  feels  still  more 
strongly  the  absence  of  that  representative  character 
which  makes  many  of  the  most  diffuse  and  formless 
fifteenth-century  moralities  social  documents  of  the 
highest  value.  Thus  destitute  as  they  were  both  of 
dramatic  power  and  of  popular  intellectual  appeal,  the 
stray  Elizabethan  remnants  of  the  old  type  found 
themselves  against  a  dead  wall,  with  no  possible  chance 
of  continuance  or  progress,  while  the  vigorous  theatri- 
cal current  of  the  day  was  deflected  by  various  alien 
influences,  and  passed  from  Heywood  to  Lyly,  Kyd, 
and  Marlowe  by  the  way  of  certain  experimental 
medleys  which  will  demand  discussion  in  the  later 
portion  of  this  chapter. 

Yet  the  moribund  species  represented  by  the  four 
dramas  named  above  does  not  merit  the  entire  dis- 
regard which  has  often  befallen  it.  Though  they  did 
nothing  to  advance  English  dramatic  art,  these  plays 
reflect  many  characteristics  of  earlier  practice.  Fur- 
thermore, they  were  evidently  written  with  great  care 


112  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

by  well  educated,  if  untalented,  authors,  and  they 
illustrate  not  inadequately  the  general  level  of  poetic 
taste  and  metrical  achievement  during  the  rather  bar- 
ren period  between  Tottel's  "  Miscellany "  (1557)  and 
the  appearance  of  Spenser  (1579). 

"A  new  Enterlude,  neuer  before  this  tyme  imprynted, 
entreating  of  the  Life  and  Repentaunce  of  Marie 
Magdalene.  .  .  .  Made  by  the  learned  clarke  Lewis 
Wager,"  was  printed  in  1566,  after  having  been  entered 
on  the  Stationers'  Register  during  the  same  year.  A 
second  edition  appeared  in  1567.  Though  certainly 
belonging  to  the  morality  class,  this  play  varies  in  a 
number  of  particulars  from  the  ordinary  type,  and 
bears  pretty  clear  witness  to  the  influence  of  John 
Bale.  In  agreement  with  the  usual  practice  of  the  lat- 
ter poet,  the  allegorical  figures  appear  in  connection 
with  real  Biblical  incidents  and  with  certain  concrete 
characters.  Thus,  in  the  play  before  us,  eleven  sym- 
bolic actors  are  associated  with  the  three  historic  per- 
sonages of  Mary  Magdalene,  Simon  the  Pharisee,  and 
Christ.  Again,  the  vice,  Infidelity,  bears  the  same 
name  as  in  Bale's  "Three  Laws,"  is  similarly  repre- 
sented as  the  leader  of  the  powers  of  evil,  and  in  both 
plays  shows  only  the  most  incidental  traces  of  comedy. 
The  great  difference  between  Bale  and  his  apparent 
imitator  lies  in  the  much  less  strongly  marked  contro- 
versial tone  of  the  latter.  Wager,  indeed,  is  known  to 
have  been,  like  Bale,  an  Anglican  clergyman,  —  he  was 
rector  of  Garlickhithe  in  1560,  —  but  his  play  breathes 
no  such  fiery  anti-Roman  polemic  as  the  dramas  of  the 
other  poet;  and  this  moderation  of  theological  doc- 
trine, while  largely  accounting  for  the  flatness  of  "Mary 
Magdalene"  in  comparison  with  "The  Three  Laws," 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         113 

points  also  to  a  later  period  of  composition.  It  seems 
to  me  likely  —  in  disagreement  with  the  opinion  of  the 
editor  of  the  play  —  that  Mary  Magdalene  was  com- 
posed after  the  heat  of  religious  controversy  had  sub- 
sided, and  not  long,  probably,  before  its  publication. 

The  piece  opens  with  an  interesting  defence  of  acted 
plays  and  a  remonstrance  against  the  Puritan  detract- 
ors of  the  histrionic  "faculty."  Yet  everything  shows 
how  utterly  impossible  it  must  have  been  for  such  a 
production  to  gain  the  attention  of  the  captious  audi- 
ences which  the  earlier  interludes  had  amused.  Through 
a  total  length  of  more  than  twenty-one  hundred  lines 
the  interest  steadily  declines.  The  only  readable  por- 
tion is  that  which  depicts  the  perversion  of  Mary  by 
the  vices  of  Infidelity,  Pride,  Cupidity,  and  Carnal 
Concupiscence;  and  this  portion  extends  little  beyond 
the  first  third  of  the  play.  The  rest  is  a  peculiarly  tame 
rehandling  of  Scriptural  narrative,  with  no  central  plot 
or  clearness  of  character  portrayal.  Difficult  to  read, 
and  nearly  intolerable,  one  would  suppose,  to  witness, 
the  drama  fails  equally  in  each  of  the  two  qualities 
which  had  served  to  animate  the  earlier  interludes. 
Though  it  possesses  a  few  realistic  touches,  of  which 
the  best  are  the  exclamations  of  Mary  upon  her  ill- 
made,  "bungarly"  garments  and  her  inattentive  wait- 
ing maids,  there  is  little  conscious  attempt  at  humor 
either  of  incident  or  character.  Nor,  on  the  other 
hand,  do  the  vices  —  Infidelity  and  his  satellites  — 
make  up  for  their  comparative  deficiency  in  comic 
interest  by  that  close  connection  with  contemporary 
evils  in  church  and  society  which  gives  point  and  dra- 
matic effectiveness  to  the  similar  creations  of  Bale. 

"The  Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man,"  registered  October 


114  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

22,  1576,  and  published  in  the  same  year,  is  thus  a 
decade  subsequent  to  Wager's  "  Mary  Magdalene  "  in 
the  date  of  its  appearance;  and  it  stands  perceptibly 
nearer  to  realistic  comedy.  Its  eighteen  dramatis  per- 
sonce  are  divided  between  allegorical  abstractions  and 
such  type  figures  as  the  Tenant,  the  Courtier,  and  the 
Sergeant.  In  Greediness  the  Merchant  the  two  cate- 
gories are  united.  The  scene  is  distinctly  laid  in  con- 
temporary London,  and  the  interest  of  the  piece  is 
wholly  economic,  rather  than  moral,  historic,  or  po- 
lemical, so  that  the  play  finds  its  most  natural  position 
as  a  continuation  of  the  species  represented  by  "Res- 
publica"  and  "Wealth  and  Health."  Though  only  a 
couple  of  hundred  lines  shorter  than  Wager's  moral- 
Biblical  drama,  and  hardly  less  confused  in  plot,  the 
present  work,  which  the  title-page  states  to  have  been 
"compiled  by  George  Wapull,"  is  a  considerably  more 
entertaining  production.  It  has  at  least  the  merit  of  a 
single  definite  theme:  the  injury  done  to  the  commu- 
nity by  the  inhuman  rapacity  of  the  usurers  and  mer- 
chants of  the  day.  This  theme  is  set  forth  in  the  Pro- 
logue, and  it  is  illustrated  through  the  whole  course  of 
the  drama  in  the  misfortunes  of  an  impoverished  cour- 
tier, a  tormented  tenant,  and  a  debtor  arrested  while 
attending  a  preaching  at  Paul's  Cross.  The  play  ends 
conventionally,  but  most  unrealistically,  with  the  in- 
tervention of  Christianity  in  propria  persona,  sup- 
ported by  Faithful  Few,  Authority,  and  Correction. 
The  action  is  complicated  by  the  intrusion  of  a  plot 
suggestive  of  interludes  of  foreign  influence  like  "The 
Disobedient  Child,"  *  in  which  are  presented  the  con- 
sequences of  the  rash  marriage  of  Wastefulness  with 
1  See  p.  125  ff. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        115 

the  maid  Wantonness.  Wastefulness  is  soon  brought 
to  destitution;  and  in  a  scene  strikingly  like  one  of 
Spenser's  is  being  tempted  by  Despair  "in  some  ougly 
shape"  to  kill  himself  "with  Cord  or  with  knyfe," 
when  Faithful  Few  rescues  him  and  puts  the  mon- 
ster to  flight  by  means  of  prayer  to  the  Heavenly 
Father.1 

The  vice  of  this  play,  Courage,  is  decidedly  the  most 
interesting  in  the  group,  and  he  speaks  nearly  one 
third  of  the  lines  of  the  drama  (585  out  of  1879).  The 
entirely  a-moral  tone  of  the  work  is  well  indicated  by 
the  fact  that  Courage,  though  he  has  command  of  the 
Barge  of  Sin,  and  though  he  is  finally  led  away  to  jail 
by  Correction  after  much  pernicious  activity,  does  not 
symbolize  any  theological  vice,  and,  as  the  author  very 
candidly  admits,  may  incite  to  good  as  well  as  evil.  It 
is  evident  that  the  tendency  of  the  mediaeval  moralists 
to  divide  all  mundane  phenomena  into  the  two  rigid 
groups  of  the  righteous  and  the  unrighteous  —  a 
tendency  which  we  have  found  the  author  of  "Nature" 
already  tacitly  questioning  on  the  very  threshold  of  the 
Renaissance  2  —  has  in  this  play  of  Wapull  entirely 
broken  down.  And  it  was  this  mediaeval  root-idea  of 
the  essential  hostility  and  incompatibility  of  the  forces 
of  good  and  evil  upon  which  was  based  the  entire 
morality  convention. 

"The  Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man"  illustrates  well  the 
metrical  peculiarities  of  this  group  of  late  interludes, — 
the  wreckage,  as  it  were,  of  the  old  morality  fashion. 
The  construction  of  the  strict  pentameter  line,  though 

1  Cf.  Faerie  Queene,  Book  I,  Canto  ix,  stanzas  49-54;  and  Mar- 
lowe's Doctor  Faiultu,  11.  680  ff. 
*  See  p.  73. 


116  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

known  to  Skelton,1  seems  hardly  to  have  been  under- 
stood by  these  authors.  Instead,  they  employ  the  de- 
praved measure  into  which  the  Chaucerian  pentameter 
had  broken  during  the  fifteenth  century,  —  a  metre 
consisting  most  often  of  four  stresses,  with  an  inde- 
finite number  of  slightly  accented  syllables.  The  differ- 
ence between  assonance  and  rime  seems  also  hardly 
to  have  been  appreciated;  imperfect  rimes  abound. 
Otherwise,  however,  these  plays  are  written  with  an 
excess  of  care.  Wapull  gives  greatest  prominence  to  the 
quatrain  form  with  alternate  rime,  almost  precisely 
half  his  play  being  written  in  that  measure.  Riming 
couplets  are  employed  through  another  quarter  of  the 
work  (four  hundred  and  fifty  lines),  less,  probably,  be- 
cause of  any  lighter  tone  in  the  dialogue  than  from  the 
simple  desire  of  variety.  Rime  royal  —  the  conven- 
tional aristocratic  seven -line  stanza  —  appears  in 
about  two  hundred  lines  of  especial  gravity:  in  the 
author's  Prologue  (1-56) ;  the  laments  of  the  "Tenaunt 
tormented"  (794-835),  the  impoverished  courtier 
(1082-1116)  and  the  arrested  debtor  (1393-1406);  and 
in  the  first  long  speeches  of  Christianity  and  Faithful 
Few  (1440-1488).  One  entire  scene,  that  between 
Courage  and  Wilful  Wanton,  or  Wantonness  (11.  836- 
967),  is  written  in  a  metrical  freak,  —  quatrains  with 
a  single  rime  (aaaa,  bbbb,  etc.). 

Three  song  measures  are  used  with  skill:  aabccb  (57- 
158),  ababcc  (291-311),  and  ababccdd  (1337-1358). 
The  period  to  which  this  play  belongs,  the  earlier  half 
of  Elizabeth's  reign,  was  essentially  a  lyric  period,  and 
the  four  songs  introduced  into  the  piece  far  exceed  the 

1  The  best  discussion  of  Skelton's  use  of  metre  for  dramatic 
purposes  will  be  found  in  R.  L.  Ramsay's  edition  of  Magnificence. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        117 

body  of  the  text  in  literary  merit.  It  is  only,  indeed,  in 
such  snatches  of  song  as  the  following  that  one  recog- 
nizes Wapull  and  his  companions  for  what  they  were,  — 
serious-minded  litterateurs  conscientiously  writing  up 
to  the  height  of  the  artistic  standards  of  their  age: — 

"  We  haue  great  gayne,  with  little  payne. 
And  lightly  spend  it  to: 
We  doe  not  toyle,  nor  yet  we  moyle. 
As  other  pore  foikes  do. 
We  are  winners  all  three, 
And  so  will  we  bee, 
Where  euer  that  we  come  a: 
For  we  know  how, 
To  bend  and  bow 
And  what  is  to  be  done  a. 

"Though  Wastfulnesse  and  Wantonnesse, 
Some  men  haue  vs  two  named: 
Yet  pleasauntnesse  and  plyauntnesse. 
Our  names  we  haue  now  framed, 
For  as  I  one  is  pleasaunt,  to  kisse  and  to  cully. 
The  other  is  plyaunt  as  euer  was  holly. 

As  Youth  would  it  haue, 

So  will  we  be  braue." 

T.  Lupton's  "Moral  and  Pitiful  Comedie  Intituled 
All  for  Money.  Plainly  representing  the  manners  of 
men  and  fashion  of  the  world  noweadays  "  (1578)  is  re- 
lated in  its  contemporary  and  economic  interest  to  a 
number  of  the  works  hitherto  discussed,  and  like  sev- 
eral of  them,  it  seems  to  have  attempted  to  ensure 
itself  against  uncertainty  concerning  the  proper  dra- 
matic model  by  a  mixture  of  characters  and  incidents 
from  all  the  known  fields.  Its  huge  total  of  thirty-one 
dramatis  persona  is  made  up  partly  from  Scripture 
direct,  as  in  the  case  of  Dives,  Judas,  Satan;  partly 


118  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

from  religious  allegory  (e.  g.,  Godly  Admonition, 
Pride,  Gluttony);  partly  from  scholastic  terminology 
(Theology,  Art,  Science).  Figures  such  as  Learning 
with  Money,  Learning  without  Money,  Money  with- 
out Learning,  Neither  Money  nor  Learning  suggest  the 
old  debat,  which  we  have  seen  revived  by  Heywood 
in  "Witty  and  Witless"  and  the  "Play  of  Love."  So- 
cial types  are  presented  in  Prest  for  Pleasure  and  Swift 
to  Sin;  while  realistic  comedy  is  frankly  introduced  in 
Gregory  Graceless,  William  with  the  two  wives,  Nichol 
Never  out  of  the  Law  (a  rich  franklin),  Mother  Croote, 
and  Sir  Laurence  Livingless,  the  foolish  Romanist 
parson,  who  decries  the  Reformation  and  the  transla- 
tion of  Scripture.  Those  who  sat  through  the  sixteen 
hundred  lines  of  this  play  witnessed  a  performance 
in  no  way  less  comprehensive  or  spectacular  than 
the  modern  variety  entertainment.  All  the  costumes 
were  striking,  and  some  of  the  feats  of  prestidigitation 
veritably  astounding.  One  scene  presents  with  a  vivid- 
ness not  easily  surpassed  a  pessimistic  view  of  the  con- 
sequences of  wealth.  Money  enters  with  great  boasts 
of  his  power  over  all  conditions  of  men,  and  seats  him- 
self in  state  to  receive  the  homage  of  his  follower, 
Adulation.  Suddenly  he  is  overcome  with  sickness, 
and  the  stage  direction  explains,  "Here  Money  shal 
make  as  though  he  would  vomit,  and  with  some  fine 
conueyance  Pleasure  shal  appeare  from  beneath,  and 
lie  there  apparelled."  Money  goes  out,  leaving  his 
son  Pleasure  to  undergo  the  same  distressing  ordeal, 
whence  arises  Sin,  the  vice.  Sin  inherits  the  family 
disease  and  vomits  Damnation,  who  is  to  be  "finely 
conueyed  as  the  other  was  before,  who  shal  haue  a 
terrible  vysard  on  his  face  and  his  garment  shal  be 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         119 

painted  with  flames  of  fire."  The  titular  hero  of  the 
piece,  "All  for  Money,"  is  a  venal  magistrate,  who 
proclaims  through  the  vice  Sin,  that  all  suitors  coming 
in  the  name  of  Money,  "Be  their  matter  neuer  so 
wrong,  they  shalbe  sped  and  not  tarrie."  The  peti- 
tioners accordingly  appear  very  much  as  in  Heywood's 
"Play  of  the  Weather,"  which  most  likely  gave  Lupton 
a  number  of  hints. 

A  feeble  and  entirely  unsuccessful  attempt  at  re- 
crudescence of  the  old  serious  spirit  and  broad  scope  of 
the  morality  manifests  itself  in  the  undated  interlude  of 
W.  Wager,  entitled:  "The  longer  thou  liuest  the  more 
foole  thou  art.  A  Myrrour  very  necessarie  for  youth, 
and  specially  for  such  as  are  like  to  come  to  dignitie  and 
promotion."  The  plot  follows  the  career  of  the  fool, 
Moros,  from  the  time  when  as  a  schoolboy  he  mocks 
and  neglects  the  good  Protestant  admonition  of  his 
pedagogues,  Discipline,  Pity,  and  Exercitation,  till  he 
is  smitten  down  in  gray  old  age  by  God's  Judgment, 
and  carried  off  "to  the  Deuill"  by  Confusion.  But  so 
ambitious  a  scheme  was  quite  disproportioned  to  the 
author's  powers  of  execution.  Not  only  does  he  fail  — 
as  any  writer  of  his  generation  must  in  this  species 
have  inevitably  failed  —  of  reproducing  the  stern 
Miltonic  dignity  of  "Everyman"  and  "The  Castle  of 
Perseverance."  He  shows  himself  unable  to  sustain 
even  an  artificial  unity  through  the  length  of  two  thou- 
sand lines,  and  his  large  patchwork  structure  creaks 
and  groans  through  every  joint.  The  only  readable 
fragments  are  a  few  frankly  occasional  and  topical  in- 
sertions, such  as  Moros's  two  interesting  centos  of  odd 
lines  from  popular  songs  of  the  day,  and  People's 
quaint  alphabetical  list  of  the  followers  of  Moros:  — 


120  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"Syr  Anthony  Arrogant,  Auditour, 
Bartilmew  brybor,  Bayly: 
Clement  Catchpole,  Cofferer, 
Diuision,  doublefaced  dauie, 
Edmund  enuiouse,  ehiefe  of  the  Eawery, 
Fabian  falshode,  his  head  farmer, 
Gregory  gorbely,  the  goutie, 
Gouerneth  the  grayne  in  the  garner,"  etc.1 

The  time  was  now  well  past  when  a  respectable 
drama  could  be  produced  by  any  writer  who  brought 
to  his  task  only  the  heritage  of  mediaeval  convention. 
The  life  and  spirit  of  the  hour  were  everywhere  abroad 
and  pushed  themselves  inevitably  into  all  imagina- 
tive works  not  engendered  in  an  absolute  intellectual 
vacuum.  Two  very  late  interludes  "The  Conflict  of 
Conscience"  and  "The  Contention  between  Liberality 
and  Prodigality"  are  interesting  as  representing  in 
different  ways  a  forlorn  hope  at  retention  of  the  moral- 
ity form  in  the  face  of  new  realistic  influences  which 
render  it  entirely  ineffective. 

The  first  of  these  plays  was  written  by  "Nathaniell 
Woodes,  Minister,  in  Norwich"  and  printed  in  1581  as 
"An excellent  newCommedie  . . .  Contayninge,  A  most 
lamentable  example  of  the  dolef  ull  desperation  of  a 
miserable  world-linge  termed  by  the  name  of  Philo- 
logus,  who  forsooke  the  trueth  of  Gods  Gospel,  f or  feare 
of  the  losse  of  lyfe  &  worldly  goods."  The  eighteen 
parts  are  arranged  for  distribution  among  six  players, 
"most  conuenient  for  such  as  be  disposed  either  to 
shew  the  Comedie  in  priuate  houses,  or  otherwise." 
This  drama  —  which  the  Prologue  excuses  as  a  trifle 
produced,  for  moral  edification,  when  the  author's 

1  Such  fantastic  alphabets  were  entirely  conventional.  Other 
instances  occur  in  Thersitea  and  R.  B.'s  Appiua  and  Virginia. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         121 

mind  was  wearied  "From  reading  grave  and  ancient 
works "   —  is  plainly  the  creation  of  an  amateur  and  a 
Protestant  zealot.   The  piece  is  divided  into  six  acts, 
presenting  the  career  of  a  champion  of  religious  reform, 
Philologus,  who,  denounced  by  Caconos,  an  ignorant 
northern  priest,  is  brought  to  trial  before  an  inquisi- 
torial body  composed  of  a  Cardinal,  Tyranny  (alias, 
Zeal),  Avarice,  and  Hypocrisy.  Here  he  stoutly  vindi- 
cates his  belief,  till  won  over  by  Sensual  Suggestion 
and  the  enchanted  mirror  in  which  she  shows  him  the 
pleasures  of  this  world.  Turning  a  deaf  ear  to  the  warn- 
ings of  his  good  spirit  and  of  Conscience,  the  recusant 
enjoys  for  a  time,  with  his  two  sons,  the  fruits  of  his 
compliance  with  Rome,  but  he  is  soon  visited  by  Hor- 
ror and  driven  to  the  verge  of  suicide.  In  a  long  scene 
of  twenty  pages,  strongly  suggestive  of  that  in  which 
the  scholars  offer  last  comfort  to  Faustus,  the  despair- 
ing Philologus  is  reminded  of  the  mercy  of  God  by  his 
friends  Eusebius  and  Theologus;  and  the  nuntius  ap- 
pears in  a  brief  epilogue,  dignified  by  the  title  of  Act  VI, 
to  declare  that  the  penitent  has  renounced  all  his  errors, 
abhorred  his  blasphemies,  and  made  a  godly  end. 

The  most  remarkable  thing  about  this  awkward,  but 
perfervid  dramatic  tract  is  that  its  ostensibly  symbolic 
hero  was  an  actual  personality  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury,—  perhaps  an  Italian  lawyer,  Francis  Spiera, 
who,  after  abjuring  the  tenets  of  Protestantism,  com- 
mitted suicide  in  remorse.1  The  Prologue  reminds  the 

1  The  identification  of  Philologus  with  Spiera  emanates  from  Col- 
lier, who  is  very  disingenuous  in  his  statement  that  "  the  apostasy 
of  Francis  Spira.  or  Spiera,  is  announced  as  the  main  subject"  on  the 
title-page.  The  title-page,  on  the  contrary,  merely  refers  to  an 
unnamed  "  miserable  world-linge." 


122  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

audience  that  the  argument  of  the  play  is  "a  history 
strange  and  true,  to  many  men  well  known,"  though 
the  author  has  thought  it  meet  to  omit  actual  names. 
Thus  we  have  the  spectacle  of  Mr.  Woodes  building 
sand  walls  against  the  tide,  attempting  in  an  excess 
of  theological  ardor  to  transmute  actual  history  into 
moral  abstraction  just  at  the  time  when  dramatic 
progress  was  everywhere  replacing  the  abstract  by  the 
concrete.  The  play  has  an  interest,  therefore,  as  indi- 
cating the  final  refuge  of  allegorical  drama  among  the 
same  unprogressive  class  of  religious  homilists  with 
whom  it  began. 

"The  Contention  between  Liberality  and  Prodigal- 
ity "  is  the  last  gasp  of  the  Tudor  morality.  Published 
in  1602,  a  specific  reference  to  February  4  of  the  forty- 
third  year  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  seems  to  point  to  that 
date  (February  4,  1601,  N.  S.)  as  the  time  of  the 
royal  presentation  advertised  on  the  title-page.1  As 
"The  Conflict  of  Conscience"  shows  the  allegorical 
drama  revived  by  the  archaic  dilettantism  of  a 
preacher  turned  dramatist,  the  present  play  owes  its 
partial  adherence  to  the  antiquated  form  to  the  con- 
fessed youthful  inexperience  of  the  writer, — probably 
a  member  of  one  of  the  inns  of  court  or  some  similar 
play-giving  institution.  The  plot  treats  the  old  theme 
of  the  vagaries  of  fortune,  tracing  the  experiences  of 
Money  in  the  hands  of  the  three  rival  claimants, 
Prodigality,  Tenacity,  and  Liberality.  However,  there 
is  no  fixity  of  outline  or  purpose,  and  the  piece  is  dis- 
tressingly hard  to  read,  because  the  author  is  continu- 

1  Professor  Schelling  (Elizabethan  Drama,  ii,  554)  states  that  the 
play  was  written  1565  and  revised  in  1601.  This  may  have  been  the 
case. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        123 

ally  straying  from  one  side  to  the  other  of  the  line 
which  separates  symbolism  and  actuality,  obscuring 
his  moral  by  little  aimless  sallies  into  the  realm  of 
picaresque  realism.  Neither  as  interlude  nor  as  comedy 
of  manners  does  the  "Contention"  merit  serious  con- 
sideration, but  it  possesses  some  good  songs  and 
serves  to  indicate  how  the  well-cultivated  taste  for 
abstraction,  languishing  at  this  period  from  neglect, 
could  a  little  later  satisfy  itself  in  the  Jacobean  masque. 

Thus  the  survivals  of  the  old  interlude  which  kept 
themselves  closest  to  the  early  Tudor  form  dragged 
out  a  somewhat  varied  existence  during  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth,  and  perished  for  want  of  an  audience.  In 
other  instances,  however,  the  interlude,  by  making  con- 
cessions to  the  change  in  taste,  was  able  to  continue  its 
hold  upon  popular  favor  and  to  exert  a  not  inconsider- 
able influence  upon  the  new  drama.  Before  the  Tudor 
period  was  half  over,  the  more  progressive  writers  of 
interludes  began  to  feel  impatience  at  the  limited  pos- 
sibilities of  their  inherited  material,  and  to  look  abroad 
for  sources  whence  they  might  freshen  the  desiccated 
substance  of  the  morality.  Lon.u;  before  the  death  of 
Henry  VIII,  John  Heywood  had  achieved  an  individ- 
ual tour  de  force  by  his  bold  introduction  of  new  ele- 
ments from  the  narrative  work  of  Chaucer  and  from 
contemporary  French  farce.  Somewhat  later,  inter- 
ludes commence  to  show  close  kinship  with  the  Latin 
drama  prevalent  at  the  time  in  Germany  and  Holland, 
• —  very  largely  because  of  the  new  feeling  of  solidarity 
produced  among  the  Protestant  nations  of  the  north  by 
the  Reformation  conflict.  The  most  important  Eng- 
lish plays  of  this  nature  are  the  anonymous  "Nice 


124  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Wanton"  (1560)  and  "The  Disobedient  Child"  by 
Thomas  Ingelend,  both  published  after  Elizabeth's 
accession,  but  first  composed,  as  there  is  reason  to  be- 
lieve, before  the  death  of  Edward  VI  in  1553.  These 
works  take  up  again  the  popular  subject  of  perverted 
youth  and  treat  it  in  conformity  with  the  dramatic  ver- 
sions of  the  Prodigal  Son  story  then  fashionable  in  the 
Latin  plays  of  the  Continent.1 

"Nice  Wanton'*2  is  one  of  the  most  successful  es- 
says in  the  interlude  form.  Its  five  hundred  and  fifty- 
two  lines  bring  it  well  within  the  small  compass  which 
the  contemporary  conditions  of  presentation  rendered 
desirable.  Its  author,3  moreover,  has  been  able  to  blend 
the  serious  didactic  spirit  and  comprehensive  outline 
of  the  best  educational  interludes,  and  the  most  effec- 
tive of  the  old  stock  types,  as  presented  in  Iniquity,  the 
Vice,  and  Worldly  Shame,  the  Nemesis,  with  concrete 
scenes  and  figures  of  Dutch  realism  in  a  composite 
which  far  exceeds  the  individual  capabilities  of  either 
species.  The  "Rebelles,"  a  comedy  of  the  Dutch 
Latinist  Georgius  Macropedius,  first  published  in  1535, 
has  been  claimed  as  a  source  of  "Nice  Wanton,"  and 

1  An  English  version  of  Acolastus,  the  most  famous  of  the  Dutch- 
Latin  plays  on  this  theme,  was  executed  by  John  Palsgrave,  "Lon- 
doniensis,"  and  published  in  1540. 

2  The  title  of  this  play  means,  of  course,  not  "  la  jolie  p£cheresse," 
as  M.  Jusserand  translates  it,  but  rather  "the  foolish  spoiled  child," 
"der  alberne  ZSgling." 

3  The  initials  "T.  R."  printed  at  the  end  of  the  play  in  some  mod- 
ern texts  give  no  hint  concerning  the  authorship  of  the  play.  The  let- 
ters belong  to  the  vignette  inserted  at  the  end  of  King's  edition. 
The  same  vignette,  with  the  letters,  appears  also  at  the  beginning  of 
King's  edition  of  Impatient  Poverty  and  is  evidently  an  inheritance 
from  some  earlier  printer  with  the  initials  T.  R. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         125 

some  relationship,  lineal  or  collateral,  certainly  appears 
to  exist.  However,  a  comparison  of  the  two  works 
brings  out  the  essential  differences  more  strongly  than 
anything  else,  and  emphasizes  the  real  value  of  the  ele- 
ments which  the  English  dramatist  derived  from  the 
morality  convention.  The  boisterous  vigor  of  the  songs 
and  of  the  dialogue  of  the  bad  children,  Ismael  and 
Dalila,  with  their  seducer,  Iniquity;  the  broad  sweep 
of  the  play,  which  in  its  brief  compass  —  little  over 
half  that  of  the  "Rebelles"  —  embraces  the  beginning 
and  the  end  of  life;  most  of  all,  the  stern  spirit  which 
insists  that  the  wages  of  sin  be  fully  paid,  refusing  the 
comic  termination  of  Macropedius,  and  requiring  even 
of  the  vice,  in  return  for  his  assumption  of  concrete 
human  personality,  that  he  expiate  his  offences  like  his 
confederate  by  hanging:  all  these  qualities  belong  to 
"Nice  Wanton,"  not  by  foreign  importation,  but  by 
inheritance  from  the  morality;  and  they  indicate  how 
much  true  force  and  promise  the  interlude  still  pos- 
sessed when  once  turned  into  fresh  and  fruitful  fields. 
"The  Disobedient  Child"  is  a  production  of  no  such 
excellence  as  "Nice  Wanton,"  but  it  shows  how  an 
English  playwright  about  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth 
century  could  borrow  a  foreign  plot  and  could  con- 
siderably broaden  its  scope  and  effectiveness  by  the 
help  of  the  matter  which  he  found  at  home.  This 
drama  touches  much  more  lightly  than  "  Nice  Wanton  " 
the  same  theme  of  the  just  punishment  which  may 
befall  ill-advised  and  self-indulgent  youth.  We  have 
here  pictured,  not  the  criminal  career  and  end  of  two 
wholly  perverted  children,  but  the  folly  of  a  pampered 
son,  who,  despising  his  father's  exhortation  to  study, 
and  the  admonition  to  beware  of  women,  soon  finds 


126  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

himself  trapped  into  marriage  with  a  shrew,  and  desti- 
tute of  the  means  of  livelihood. 

The  source  from  which  Ingelend  derived  the  rough 
framework  of  his  play  is  a  prose  dialogue  of  the  French 
Latinist,  Ravisius  Textor  (Jean  Tixier  de  Ravisi,  1480- 
1524) ;  but  Textor's  scant  two  hundred  and  thirty-five 
lines  of  question  and  answer  between  a  colorless  Pater 
Juvenis  and  Uxor  are  expanded,  in  the  fifteen  hundred 
lines  of  the  English  work,  into  a  drama  of  much  higher 
intensity  and  literary  merit  than  the  original  in  any 
way  suggested.1  Fairly  mellifluous  speeches  in  alternate 
rime  succeed  the  laconic  clumsiness  of  mediaeval  prose 
latinity.  Two  songs  are  introduced  in  deference  to 
native  practice,  of  which  the  first  at  least  possesses  real 
beauty,  and  prologue  and  epilogue  are  added.  The 
three  main  figures  are  depicted  with  a  leisurely  atten- 
tion to  concrete  detail  entirely  foreign  to  Textor's 
method,  and  they  are  supplemented  by  five  new  comic 
characters  in  the  man  cook  and  woman  cook,  the 
priest,  the  prodigal's  servant,  and  Satan  himself,  —  the 
last  brought  upon  the  stage  in  frank  reminiscence  of 
the  English  mystery,  to  amuse  the  audience  with  his 
shout,  — 

"  Ho,  ho,  ho,  what  a  fellow  am  I ! 
Give  room,  I  say,  both  more  and  less;" 

and  to  moralize  the  immediately  foregoing  picture  of 
marital  discord.  The  five  ineffective  and  ill-connected 
scenes  of  Textor  are  altered,  multiplied,  and  in  one 

1  There  survives  a  single  printed  leaf  out  of  an  English  interlude 
which  appears  to  have  followed  the  same  dialogue  of  Textor  with 
less  freedom.  This  fragment,  which  antedates  the  publication  of 
Ingelend's  work,  will  be  found  reprinted  in  the  Malone  Society  "Col- 
lections," I,  i,  27-30  (1907). 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         127 

case  subdivided  by  Ingelend  in  a  manner  which  con- 
spicuously emphasizes  the  English  poet's  realization 
of  the  need  for  comic  relief  and  dramatic  probability. 
The  classical  allusions  of  the  Latin  text  are,  indeed,  all 
retained  by  Ingelend  with  the  scrupulous  care  natural 
in  one  who  wished  to  have  himself  known  "late  stu- 
dent in  Cambridge,"  but  otherwise  "  The  Disobedient 
Child  "  shows  itself  vividly  English  in  tone,  and  original 
in  every  essential  of  treatment.  Thus,  this  play  illus- 
trates, like  the  other  members  of  its  class,  the  two  out- 
standing features  of  the  mid-sixteenth-century  inter- 
lude: the  avidity,  upon  the  one  hand,  with  which  it 
culled  new  plot-material,  even  in  the  most  unpromising 
foreign  fields;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  great  con- 
stant "Zugkraft"  which  caused  it,  automatically,  as  it 
were,  to  vitalize  and  domesticate  all  its  borrowings. 

The  last  example  of  the  transitional  interlude  based 
on  the  Prodigal  Son  motif  of  the  continental  Latinists  is 
George  Gascoigne's  "  Glass  of  Government,"  first  pub- 
lished in  1577.  This  play,  in  which  I  am  unable  to  dis- 
cern the  merits  pointed  out  by  a  recent  biographer  of 
Gascoigne,1  seems  to  be  much  the  poorest  of  all  the 
extant  essays  in  its  kind;  and  it  offers  rather  unneces- 
sary proof  of  the  inherent  impossibility  that  English 
drama  should  derive  any  permanent  guidance  from  a 
model  so  alien  and  inflexible  as  the  academic  Latin 
comedy  of  the  German  moralists.  In  the  case  of  "Nice 
Wanton"  and  "The  Disobedient  Child"  we  see  how 
English  writers  have  struck  out,  in  the  heat  of  dis- 
covery of  a  new  genre,  dramas  which  owe  such  excel- 
lence as  they  possess  to  their  native  rather  than  im- 
ported characteristics.  Gascoigne,  however,  who  had 
1  See  F.  E.  Schelling,  Publ.  Univ.  Penn.,  ii,  4  (1895),  47. 


128  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

already  qualified  himself  for  a  certain  curious  celebrity 
as  the  translator  of  a  Latin-Italian  comedy  and  a  Greek 
Italian  tragedy,1  has  attempted  in  "The  Glass  of  Gov- 
ernment "  a  mere  pedestrian  imitation  of  the  then  fa- 
miliarly known  work  of  the  school  of  Macropedius. 

Couched  in  undistinguished  and  tedious  prose,  this 
play  follows  the  Terentian  comic  model  in  all  matters  of 
form, — in  its  neat  division  of  act  and  scene,  its  restric- 
tion of  the  locality  presented  to  Antwerp,  and  its  sup- 
planting of  stage  action  by  the  reports  of  messengers, 
as  well  as  in  its  use  of  rudely  portrayed  stock  types : 
the  pedant,  the  parasite,  the  harlot,  the  knavish 
servant  (Ambidexter),  and  dissolute  sons,  and  in  its 
chorus  of  grave  burghers.  In  the  spirit  of  the  piece  Gas- 
coigne  imitates  equally  unimaginatively  the  chill  Pro- 
testant morality  of  the  Dutch  Terentians.  Nowhere 
does  the  play  reflect  any  truth  of  English  character  or 
any  situation  from  contemporary  English  life.  The 
figures  are  all  dull  and  unreal,  and  the  plot,  though 
outwardly  regular  in  its  development,  is  in  effect  per- 
fectly futile  because  it  presents  on  the  stage  nothing  of 
real  interest  or  importance,  but  leaves  all  the  signifi- 
cant events  in  the  career  of  the  two  pairs  of  good  and 
bad  children  to  be  reported  at  secondhand.  Apart  from 
all  deficiencies  of  character  drawing  and  theatrical 
manipulation,  patent  absurdity  is  involved  in  the 
structure  of  the  play  in  that  it  makes  the  entire  life 
story  of  the  four  young  men  —  Phylautus,  Phylo- 
musus,  Phylosarchus,  and  Phylotimus  —  from  their 
rudimentary  education,  through  university  experience 
and  worldly  business,  to  final  reward  or  punishment 
synchronize  with  happenings  in  the  city  of  Antwerp 
»  See  pp.  164,  196. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         129 

which  can  only  occupy  a  very  few  days  or  weeks. 
"The  Glass  of  Government"  closes  an  epoch.  With 
"The  Conflict  of  Conscience"  it  shares  the  distinc- 
tion of  being  the  last  purely  didactic  moral  play,  and  it 
is  interesting  that  its  publication  fell  upon  the  very 
year  which  brought  to  a  head  the  opposition  between 
Puritan  morality  and  dramatic  literature.1  Essentially 
a  reactionary  and  unreasoned  production,  it  gives  one 
leave  to  doubt  whether  any  higher  power  than  lucky 
accident  had  inspired  Gascoigne,  when,  nine  years 
before,  he  inaugurated  a  new  era  in  English  comedy  by 
his  translation  of  "The  Supposes." 

The  first  decade  of  Elizabeth's  reign  was  a  period  of 
considerable  theatrical  activity,  which  began  several 
innovations  all  -  important  for  the  great  drama  of 
twenty  years  later.  One  of  the  most  eventful  of  these 
was  the  reaching  out  of  the  interlude  into  the  domain 
of  history.  Conscious  of  the  inadequacy  of  allegorical 
puppets  to  satisfy  the  growing  demand  for  the  presen- 
tation of  real  life,  and  yet  unable  to  break  away  en- 
tirely from  the  traditionary  models,  the  more  ambitious 
writers  of  the  period  ventured  upon  a  bold  mingling  of 
extremes.  To  offset  the  vagueness  of  symbolic  figures, 
they  mixed  with  them  at  random  actual  celebrities 
from  the  familiar  fields  of  English  history,  Biblical 
story,  or  classic  myth.  The  inevitable  absurdity  of  this 
melange  was  naturally  fatal  to  the  experimental  works 
which  inaugurated  it,  but  the  ultimate  consequences 
were  far-reaching  and  most  salutary.  In  the  course  of 
a  quarter  century  the  alien  elements  had  fused  into  a 
complex  drama  which  joined  to  the  morality's  univer- 
sality of  appeal  the  concrete  human  application  of  his- 
1  Cf.  p.  427  f. 


130  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

toric  fact,  and  the  native  English  theatre  rested  upon 
a  firm  and  permanent  basis. 

The  first  play  to  illustrate  this  important  evolu- 
tionary tendency  is  probably  Bale's  "King  John," 
which  was  perhaps  written  as  early  as  the  reign  of 
Henry  VIII,  though  certainly  revised  after  the  acces- 
sion of  Elizabeth.  "King  John"  remained  in  manu- 
script till  the  nineteenth  century,  and  it  is  uncertain 
whether  it  was  ever  acted  in  London.1  It  can,  there- 
fore, hardly  have  exerted  much  direct  influence  upon 
English  dramatic  development.  Yet  as  an  indication 
of  general  tendencies  it  is  of  the  utmost  interest,  since 
it  shows  the  interlude  enriched  by  both  of  the  two  new 
elements  which  we  have  been  discussing;  the  imitation 
of  continental  Latin  drama  and  the  insertion  of  well- 
known  historic  figures.  The  years  of  Bale's  first  exile 
(1540-1547)  had  been  spent  very  largely  in  Lutheran 
Germany,  where  he  found  congenial  company  and 
established  relations  which  were  of  some  importance 
for  his  later  dramatic  writings.  More  than  to  any  one 
else  Bale  owes  to  the  Protestant  dramatist,  Thomas 
Kirchmayer,  author  of  a  Latin  satire  on  the  papal 
institution  called  "Pammachius"  (1538),  which  Bale 
translated  into  English,  and  which  was  performed  at 
Christ's  College,  Cambridge,  in  1545.2 

From  "Pammachius"  Bale  probably  derived  the 
first  suggestion  for  "  King  John,"  as  well  as  the  general 
satiric  method  of  the  play,  which  is  considerably  dif- 

1  See,  however,  the  interesting  document  printed  by  Collier 
(Eng.  Dram.  Poetry,  ed.  1879,  i,  123-125),  which  shows  that  "an  en- 
terlude  concernyng  King  John"  was  performed  "at  my  Lorde  of 
Canterbury's,"  Jan.  2,  1539. 

3  See  C.  H.  Herford,  Literary  Rdations,l29  f. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        131 

ferent  from  that  of  his  earlier  works;  and  the  idea  of 
presenting  the  Pope  himself  on  the  stage  as  the  leader 
of  the  powers  of  evil.  Because  of  the  introduction,  on 
the  other  hand,  of  such  actual  figures  as  King  John, 
Cardinal  Pandulphus,  Stephen  Langton,  and  Raymond 
of  Toulouse,  the  drama  has  been  sometimes  noted  as 
the  earliest  English  history  play;  but  such  a  classifica- 
tion is  rather  superficial.  The  real  affiliation  of  "King 
John"  is  rather  with  controversial  moralities  of  the 
type  of  "Magnificence"  and  "Respublica"  than  with 
the  later  "history."  It  was  written  with  the  author's 
eye  continually  upon  existing  conditions  in  religion 
and  politics,  and  King  John  himself  is  as  essentially 
unhistoric,  as  far  from  representing  an  actual  person- 
age of  a  bygone  age,  as  is  the  "Widow  England"  from 
really  typifying  the  nation  in  the  thirteenth  century. 
Langton,  Pandulphus,  and  Raymundus  are  mere 
aliases  temporarily  assumed  by  the  vices  of  Sedition, 
Private  Wealth,  and  Dissimulation.  Thus  the  first 
introduction  of  the  concrete  into  the  province  of  alle- 
gory makes  clear  the  strength  of  the  hold  which  the 
morality  convention  still  retained  upon  dramatic  proce- 
dure. Capable  not  only  of  maintaining  itself,  but  even 
of  generalizing  the  new  specific  importations,  the  sym- 
bolic tradition  could  not  be  totally  supplanted,  but  was 
very  gradually  amalgamated  with  the  newer  influences. 
The  plays  of  "Godly  Queen  Hester"  and  "King 
Darius"  show  English  playwrights  searching  again  in 
Holy  Scripture,  like  their  fourteenth-century  predeces- 
sors, for  dramatic  subjects,  but  it  is  romantic  interest 
now  and  not  moral  truth  which  they  seek.  "Queen 
Hester,"  which  the  title-page  of  the  only  extant  edition 
reports  to  have  been  "  newly  made  and  imprinted  this 


132  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

present  yere,  1561,"  relates  in  fairly  regular  manner  the 
story  of  the  advancement  of  Haman  by  Ahasuerus,  the 
marriage  of  Esther  to  the  King,  the  insolence  of  Haman 
and  his  plot  against  the  Jews,  with  their  rescue  by 
Esther  and  the  overthrow  of  Haman.  Pride,  Adula- 
tion, and  Ambition  are  introduced  to  expose  the  faults 
of  Haman,  and  the  vice,  Hardydardy,  secures  the  post 
of  fool  in  the  household  of  the  same  unscrupulous 
favorite.  It  is  impossible  to  resist  the  suspicion  of  per- 
sonal satire  in  the  delineation  of  Haman.  The  analogy 
between  his  character  and  Wolsey's  in  his  rapid  ad- 
vancement, his  arrogance,  and  his  impoverishment  of 
the  realm  —  so  that,  as  Ambition  remarks,  "if  war 
should  chance,  either  with  Scotland  or  France,  this  gear 
would  not  go  right"  —  has  impelled  several  critics  to 
regard  the  play  as  a  companion  piece  to  "Magnifi- 
cence," produced  by  a  member  of  Skelton's  party  be- 
fore the  Cardinal's  death  in  1530. 1  Against  this  view 
weighs  —  though  perhaps  with  no  absolutely  decisive 
force  —  the  repeated  assertion  of  the  title-page  that 
the  work  was  "A  newe  enterlude  —  newly  made"  in 
1561,  and  the  certainty  that  it  finds  a  more  natural 
place  among  the  interludes  of  the  period  1550-1560 
than  among  those  of  Henry  VIII's  early  reign. 

"King  Darius"  is  specifically  described  on  the  title- 
page  as  "A  Pretie  new  Enterlude  both  pithie  and 
pleasant  —  taken  out  of  the  third  and  forth  Chapter  of 
the  third  booke  of  Esdras."  The  date  of  the  extant  edi- 
tion is  1565.  The  title  and  the  statement  of  source  are 
both  rather  deceptive,  for  only  four  hundred  and  fifty 
lines  out  of  sixteen  hundred  have  any  connection  with 
Darius  or  his  court.  The  rest  of  the  play  is  definitely 
1  See  p.  82  ff. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         133 

localized  in  England  and  forms  a  perfectly  independ- 
ent moral  interlude  of  anti-papal  tendency.  The  two 
sets  of  scenes  and  the  characters  belonging  to  each  are 
entirely  distinct.  There  could  not  be  less  trace  of  as- 
similation, indeed,  had  the  poet  written  the  Darius 
scenes  separately,  and  inserted  them  arbitrarily  as  a 
further  ornament  between  the  natural  divisions  of 
his  otherwise  complete  morality.  There  is  no  evidence 
that  this  was  not  the  case.  In  "Jacob  and  Esau," 
an  admirable  Scriptural  drama  of  the  same  period 
(licensed  1557-1558),  containing  no  features  peculiar 
to  the  interlude,  and  in  A.  Golding's  frank  translation 
of  "A  Tragedie  of  Abrahams  Sacrifice.  Written  in 
French  by  Theodore  Beza"  (composed  1575),  one  finds 
further  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  native  and 
foreign  dramatic  tendencies  were  at  this  time  running 
separate  courses,  sometimes  strictly  parallel  and  dis- 
tinct, sometimes  exerting  mutual  influence,  but  not 
yet  mingled  in  a  single  current. 

There  is  good  evidence  that  playwrights,  even  as 
early  as  the  close  of  the  first  quarter  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, were  beginning  to  look  for  plot  material,  not 
only  in  the  more  orthodox  repositories  of  historical  and 
Biblical  narrative,  but  even  sometimes  in  the  literature 
of  romance.  The  bare  suggestion  of  a  romantic  strain 
in  the  interlude  of  "Saint  John  the  Evangelist"  has 
been  already  pointed  out.1  The  first  clear  instance  of 
the  same  tendency  is  found  in  the  play  generally  known 
as  "Calisto  and  Melibea,"  of  which  the  source  is  the 
earlier  portion  of  the  Spanish  novel-drama,  "Celes- 
tina."  It  would  appear  that  the  author,  or  the  pub-  \ 
lisher,  John  Rastell,  was  in  this  case  uneasily  conscious  ' 
1  See  p.  105. 


134  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  the  unconventionally  frivolous  nature  of  the  theme, 
for  on  the  title-page  he  entirely  suppresses  the  names 
of  the  notorious  lovers,  and  introduces  the  work  to  the 
reader  in  the  following  non-committal  and  enigmatic 
language:  "A  new  comedye  in  englysh  in  maner  of  an 
enterlude  ryght  elygant  &  full  of  craft  of  rethoryk, 
wherein  is  shewd  &  dyscrybyd  as  well  the  bewte  &  good 
propertesof  women  as  theyrvycys  &euyll  codicios  with 
a  morall  coclusion  &  exhortacyon  to  vertew."  Agreeably 
with  the  promise  thus  implied,  the  conclusion  of  the  play 
is  utterly  distorted  in  the  interest  of  moral  effect.  The 
absence,  however,  among  the  dramatis  persona  of  any 
allegorical  figure  and  the  entire  absorption  of  atten- 
tion in  the  progress  of  a  secular  love  intrigue  distinguish 
the  play  clearly  from  other  interludes  of  the  time,  and 
give  it  a  claim  to  rank  with  the  structurally  far  better 
comedies  of  Heywood  among  the  richest  of  all  the 
plays  of  Henry  VIII's  reign  in  promise  for  the  future 
drama. 

The  output  of  the  English  press  during  the  first  half- 
century  of  its  existence  is  known  in  considerable  degree 
from  mere  fragmentary  odds  and  ends.  No  dramatic 
loss  thus  involved,  however,  is  perhaps  more  to  be  de- 
plored than  that  of  the  interlude  dealing  with  the  love  of 
Publius  Cornelius  and  the  Lady  Lucrece,  of  which  only 
two  leaves  are  now  extant,  though  there  seems  reason 
to  hope  that  the  rest  of  the  work  is  not  irrecoverably 
lost.1  The  surviving  fragment  has  been  ascribed  to  the 
press  of  John  Rastell,  and  may  thus  have  been  asso- 
ciated in  origin  as  well  as  in  the  nature  of  its  theme 
with  "Calisto  and  Melibea." 

1  The  extant  portion  is  reprinted  in  Malone  Society  "  Collections, " 
I,  ii  (1908),  137-142. 

:/;/; 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         135 

A  much  more  advanced  work  than  any  of  the  preced- 
ing is  John  Phillip's  "Comedy  of  Meek  and  Patient 
Grissell,"in  which  the  trials  of  Boccaccio's  heroine  are 
presented,  not  altogether  unsympathetically,  by  means 
of  the  crude  allegorical  devices  of  the  moralities.  This 
play  can  be  most  satisfactorily  studied  in  connection 
with  the  contemporary  interludes  founded  on  classic 
story. 

The  earliest  example  of  the  introduction  of  classical 
figures  into  the  English  interlude  can  be  very  precisely 
dated.  It  occurs  in  the  farce  of  "Thersites,"  which  the 
fact  of  partial  translation  from  a  Latin  dialogue  of 
Ravisius  Textor  would  naturally  set  later  than  the 
publication  of  the  earliest  edition  of  Textor's  poem  in 
1530,  while  allusions  in  the  Epilogue  to  the  English 
play  to  the  birth  of  Edward  VI  and  the  illness  of 
Queen  Jane  Seymour  point  clearly  to  the  middle  of 
October  (Oct.  12-24),  1537.  "Thersites"  is  an  utterly 
absurd  performance  in  the  roughest  of  doggerel  rime, 
but  its  author  is  proved  a  fair  scholar  by  his  occasional 
variations  and  expansions  of  Textor's  mythological 
references,  while  his  large  original  infusions  of  local 
raillery  and  buffoonery  witness  a  vigorous  natural  gift 
in  the  less  polished  forms  of  farcical  merriment.  As  in 
the  parallel  case  of  "The  Disobedient  Child,"  the  two 
hundred  and  fifty  lines  of  Textor's  dialogue,  written 
this  time  in  hexameter  verse,  serve  only  as  a  point  of 
departure  for  the  English  writer,  who  quadruples  the 
poem's  length;  adds  —  in  bad  taste,  it  must  be  con- 
fessed —  the  whole  concluding  episode  of  Telemachus; 
and  uses  the  elements  of  Textor's  drama  (Thersites's 
colloquies  with  Vulcan  and  his  mother,  his  combats 
with  the  "testudo"  and  Miles)  as  occasions  for  infinite 


136  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

jest  of  local  and  contemporary  application.  Thersites 
drops  entirely  his  Homeric  character,  ogles  his  audience 
between  scenes  like  the  native  vice  in  "Like  Will  to 
Like,"  and  pours  out  indecorous  nothings  to  the  confu- 
sion of  individual  spectators. 

Quite  as  English  in  tone  as  "The  Disobedient  Child," 
this  play  shows  none  of  Ingelend's  originality  in  plot 
construction  or  character  delineation,  but  remains  in 
respect  of  these  essentials  on  the  same  plane  of  uncouth 
naivete  with  Textor's  dialogue,  and  thus  affiliates 
itself  with  a  much  less  advanced  species  of  interlude 
than  that  with  which  this  chapter  has  been  mainly 
concerned.  Everything  seems  to  indicate  that  "Ther- 
sites" was  designed  for  presentation  before  a  vulgar 
audience.  Instead  of  the  indoor  stage  on  which  scene 
follows  scene  in  orderly  progression,  we  have  here  to  do 
with  the  old  mediaeval  arrangement  of  "platea"  and 
individual  "sedes."  The- second  stage  direction  tells 
us:  "Mulciber  must  have  a  shop  made  in  the  place 
[i.  e.,  'platea'],  and  Thersites  cometh  before  it,  saying 
aloud."  This  representation  of  a  shop  stood  apparently 
on  one  side  of  the  stage  through  the  entire  play,  and 
Mulciber  four  times  comes  out  at  Thersites's  call  and 
reenters  to  execute  his  commissions.  Another  fixed  seat 
was  occupied  by  Thersites's  mother.  The  stage  direc- 
tion announces:  "Then  the  mother  goeth  in  the  place 
which  is  prepared  for  her,"  and  it  is  in  this  place,  some- 
where on  the  edge  of  the  stage  and  in  view  of  the  spec- 
tators, that  Thersites  seeks  refuge  from  Miles:  "Ther- 
sites must  run  away,  and  hide  him  behind  his  mother's 
back." 

The  stage  on  which  "Thersites  "  was  presented  thus 
bears  more  analogy  to  that  used  for  "The  Castle  of 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         137 

Perseverance  "  than  to  the  curtained  platform  ordina- 
rily employed  for  courtly  interludes;  and  other  indica- 
tions likewise  suggest  popular  performance.  The  en- 
tire lack  of  moral  import,  greater  than  in  even  the  most 
unabashed  of  Heywood's  interludes,  is  combined  with 
several  clear  concessions  to  bourgeois  taste.  The 
mythological  allusions  of  the  Latin  original,  far  from 
distasteful  to  any  educated  renaissance  audience,  are 
in  part  supplanted  by  references  to  the  vernacular  lit- 
erature of  the  humbler  classes.  Thus,  Textor's  lines, — 

"Si  monies  quibus  Enceladus  fraterque  Ryphaeus 
Tentavere  Jovem  superis  detrudere  regnis, 
Impeterent,  caderetque  in  te  scapulosus  Olympus, 
Pondere  sub  nullo  rigida  haec  lorica  fatiscat,"  — 

are  familiarized  as  follows:  — 

"  If  Malvern  Hills  should  on  thy  shoulders  light. 
They  shall  not  hurt  them,  nor  suppress  thy  might. 
If  Bevis  of  Hampton,  Colburn,  and  Guy, 
Will  thee  assay,  set  not  by  them  a  fly! 
To  be  brief,  this  habergin  shall  thee  save." 

And  in  the  subsequent  pages  the  names  of  Textor's 
classical  celebrities  are  often  fairly  pushed  out  of  the 
lines  to  make  room  for  the  mention  of  heroes  of  another 
cult,  beloved  by  the  common  people,  but  regarded  by 
the  polished  classes  of  the  day  with  unaffected  scorn,  — 
heroes  like  "King  Arthur  and  the  knights  of  the  Round 
Table,"  "Gawain  the  courteous  and  Kay  the  crabbed," 
Sir  Isenbras,  Robin  Hood,  Little  John,  and  Friar  Tuck. 
The  rollicking  absurdity  of  the  nonsense  verse  near  the 
end  of  the  play,  ringing  the  changes  on  the  names 
of  places  situated  for  the  most  part  about  the  upper 
Thames  valley,  would  hardly  have  been  tolerated  by 


138  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

an  educated  London  audience.1  So,  the  general  char- 
acter of  the  final  address  to  the  spectators,  bidding 
them  be  obedient  to  their  "rulers  and  parents,"  and 
possibly  a  note  of  uncertainty  concerning  the  progress 
of  affairs  at  court,  suggest  that  this  play,  the  first  to 
embody  the  connection  with  ancient  literature  which 
was  to  become  peculiarly  a  feature  of  fashionable 
drama,  was  written  for  a  rather  unfashionable  public 
and  performed  probably  by  schoolboys. 

"Thersites"  seems  to  have  been  a  random  manifes- 
tation, occasioned  by  the  example  of  Textor  and  devoid 
of  bearing  upon  contemporary  dramatic  practice.  A 
quarter  of  a  century  elapsed  before  the  transitional 
interlude  began  seriously  to  import  themes  and  figures 
from  classic  story;  and  then  the  plays  of  this  type  — 
Pikering's  "Horestes,"  Preston's  "Cambises,"  Ed- 
wards's  "Damon  and  Pithias,"  and  R.  B.'s  "Appius 
and  Virginia  "  —  all  produced  during  the  first  ten  or 
fifteen  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  coincided  entirely 
in  their  method,  structure,  and  their  circle  of  appeal 
with  the  Biblical  interludes  of  the  same  date.  It  hap- 
pened that  the  appearance  in  the  four  interludes  just 
named  of  dramatis  persona  from  classical  history  or 
fiction  occurred  simultaneously  with  the  attempt  to 
introduce  pure  classical  models  in  tragedy  and  comedy ; 
and  superficially  it  seems  hard  to  distinguish  between 
interludes  which  treat  Greek  or  Latin  subjects  and 
classical  imitations  which  retain  certain  features  of 

1  The  places  mentioned,  apart  from  Antwerp  and  Tunis,  are: 
Cumnor,  Tewkesbury,  Sudeley,  Comerton  (?  Combe-Martin), 
Bromwicham  (?  Birmingham),  Buckingham,  Baldockbury,  Tavis- 
tock,  Oxford,  Hinksey,  Thrutton,  Chertsey,  Cots  wold,  Malvern, 
and  London. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         1S9 

the  interlude.  The  plays  of  the  former  type  will  there- 
fore deserve  slight  further  notice  when  we  come  in  the 
next  chapters  to  trace  the  spread  of  classical  influence. 
Yet,  intrinsically  and  historically,  the  differences  which 
separate  works  like  "Cambises"  from  the  contem- 
porary "Gorboduc"  are  of  the  greatest  importance. 
In  comparison  with  the  out-and-out  provincialism  of 
"Thersites,"  plays  of  the  "Cambises"  type  appear 
rather  aristocratic  in  tone,  and  they  were  probably  all 
intended  in  the  first  instance  for  performance  on  the 
private  stage  normal  in  interlude  presentation.  But 
with  the  extension  among  the  educated  public  of  the 
rigid  demand  for  that  precise  classic  regularity  of  form 
which  "Gorboduc"  illustrates,  plays  of  mixed  char- 
acter like  "  Cambises  "  were  forced  more  and  more  to 
make  their  appeal  to  popular  and  unlettered  audi- 
ences; and  in  that  atmosphere  they  tended  to  accentu- 
ate their  comic  and  spectacular  features.  Thus  it  re- 
sulted that  the  interlude,  which  had  begun  its  active 
existence  as  the  dramatic  medium  of  the  most  refined 
and  progressive  opinion,  finally  died  out  in  these 
changed  and  degraded  survivals  as  a  cheap  and  shoddy 
vulgar  substitute  for  the  regular  Latin  tragedy  to 
which  the  polite  world  had  for  the  time  turned  its 
interest. 

John  Pikering's  "Newe  Enterlude  of  Vice,  Conteyn- 
inge  the  History  of  Horestes  "  (1567)  stands  probably 
at  the  highest  point  attained  by  the  transitional  inter- 
lude in  the  development  of  dramatic  unity  and  tragic 
purpose.  In  this  play,  to  be  sure, as  in  " King  Darius," 
there  is  a  juxtaposition  of  serious  classic  story  and  na- 
tive comedy,  but  here  it  is  the  former  constituent,  the 
representation  of  Orestes's  vengeance  upon  his  mother, 


140  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

that  takes  up  the  greater  part  of  the  drama.  The 
humorous  matter  is  subordinate.  Furthermore,  al- 
though the  two  strains  are  not  completely  fused,  they 
are  not  distinct  as  in  "King  Darius."  The  vice,  who 
goes  by  many  names,  is  one  of  the  principal  agents  in 
the  conduct  of  the  tragic  plot.  As  Courage,  he  exhorts 
Orestes  to  undertake  the  war,  and  as  Revenge,  his 
rightful  title,  he  stands  at  the  avenger's  elbow,  and 
later  points  the  moral  of  the  piece.  In  this  play  and  in 
its  less  regular  companions,  "Cambises"  and  "Ap- 
pius  and  Virginia,"  the  interlude  stands  as  close  to 
tragedy  as  even  indirect  foreign  stimulus  could  prob- 
ably ever  bring  it.  The  next  twenty  years  saw  in  Eng- 
land the  complete  dissolution  of  the  hereditary  dra- 
matic form  and  the  reincarnation  of  the  dramatic 
m 

spirit. 

But  as  the  reader  turns  from  the  conscientious  study 
of  all  the  diverse  manifestations  of  the  early  native 
mystery,  morality,  and  interlude  to  the  more  familiar 
products  of  developed  Elizabethan  comedy  or  tragedy, 
he  must  be  impressed  by  the  multiplicity  of  the  con- 
necting threads  of  influence.  The  restricted  dramatic 
current,  which  we  can  follow  for  over  two  centuries  in 
its  divagations  through  a  rather  arid  tract  of  literature, 
passed  out  into  the  broad  expanse  of  the  Elizabethan 
world  drama  by  more  mouths  than  can  easily  be 
counted. 

The  blending  of  morality  convention  with  the  re- 
naissance cult  of  pagan  mythology  shows  itself  in  "The 
Rare  Triumphs  of  Love  and  Fortune"  (1589)  and  in 
the  very  dull  and  absurd  play  of  a  well-known  actor, 
"The  Cobbler's  Prophecy,"  by  Robert  Wilson  (1594). 
"The  Three  Ladies  of  London"  (1584)  and  "Three 


A    TUDOR   INTERLUDE    (?)    IN    PROGRESS  :    LOOKING    TOWARD 
THK    AUDIENCE 

From  the  title-page  to  R.  W.'s  "  Three  Lords  and  Three  Ladies  of  London,"  1590 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION         141 

Lords  and  Three  Ladies  of  London"  (1590),  written 
probably  by  the  same  Robert  Wilson  and  bearing  his 
initials  on  their  title-pages,  show  the  interlude  in  the 
last  phase  of  its  drift  toward  city  comedy.  The  two 
plays  just  mentioned,  though  intrinsically  among  the 
dullest  of  the  interludes,  possess  a  claim  to  notice  by 
reason  of  the  obvious  seriousness  of  their  literary  pre- 
tensions. Like  such  earlier  works  as  "The  Tide  Tar- 
rieth  No  Man"  and  "All  for  Money,"  they  present  a 
sincere  criticism  of  existing  conditions  by  means  of 
literal  dozens  of  figures  and  almost  interminable  lines 
of  careful  verse.  The  sensitiveness  to  changes  of  liter- 
ary fashion,  indicated  in  the  transition  from  the  long 
rambling  couplets  of  "The  Three  Ladies"  to  the  blank 
verse  of  "The  Three  Lords  and  Three  Ladies,"  has 
been  often  noted.  What  is  perhaps  less  frequently  felt 
is  the  intimacy  with  which  these  apparently  lifeless 
pieces  represent  the  prevailing  social  interests  of  their 
day.  In  their  scourging  of  the  current  iniquities  of 
usury  and  simony,  and  in  the  timely  ridicule  of  Spanish 
arrogance  presented  in  the  later  play,  they  broach  sev- 
eral of  the  most  vital  issues  in  the  life  of  the  age.1 

A  much  more  human  and  readable  play,  even  more 
complex  in  its  affiliations,  is  the  "Merry  Knack  to 
Know  a  Knave"  (1594).  Here  the  moral  abstraction 
Honesty  plays  a  prominent  role  at  the  court  of  the 
Saxon  King  Edgar,  circumventing  and  overthrowing 
each  of  the  Bailiff  of  Hexham's  rascally  sons:  Courtier, 
Priest,  Coneycatcher,  and  Farmer.  This  medley  of 
interlude,  mythical  history,  and  comedy  of  manners  is 
further  confused  by  the  interpolation  of  a  charming 

1  Tom  Beggar  in  the  earlier  play  may  be  the  original  of  Auto-    /* 
lycus. 


142  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

romantic  sub-plot  dealing  with  the  rivalry  of  King 
Edgar  and  his  confidant  Ethanwold  for  the  hand  of  the 
Lady  Alfrida. 

Even  when  the  English  drama  was  well  entered  upon 
its  ultimate  catholic  career  in  the  work  of  Shakespeare 
and  his  greatest  contemporaries,  concrete  evidences  of 
the  force  of  the  older  fashion  still  persisted.  Charac- 
teristic devices  of  the  morality  type  repeat  themselves 
'••  in  Marlowe's  "Doctor  Faustus,"  in  Greene's  "Friar 
Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay ; "  in  the  general  structure  of 
Nash's  only  independent  play,  "Summer's  Last  Will 
and  Testament,"  and  the  general  subject  of  Peele's 
"David  and  Bethsabe"  and  Lodge  and  Greene's 
"Looking  Glass  for  London; "  most  notably  of  all  in  the 
continued  vivid  allusions  to  Vice  and  Iniquity  in  the 
works  of  Shakespeare. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

I.    DECADENT  SURVIVALS  OF  THE  OLD  TYPE 

John  the  Evangelist.  Printed,  J.  Waley,  n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1907.  Reprinted,  Malone  Society,  1907  ;  J.  S.  Farmer, 
"Lost "  Tudor  Plays,  1907.  Discussion :  H.  Bradley,  Mod.  Lang. 
Review,  July,  1907  ;  W.  H.  Williams,  "  Irisdisiou  in  the  Inter- 
lude of  Johan  the  Euangelyst,"  Mod.  Lang.  Review,  July,  1908. 

Wealth  and  Health  (S.  R.,  1557).  Ed.  n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1907.  Reprinted,  Malone  Society,  1907  ;  J.  S.  Farmer, 
"  Lost "  Tudor  Plays,  1907  ;  F.  Holthausen,  Kiel,  1908. 

FULWELL,  ULPIAN  :  Like  Will  to  Like.  Two  early  editions  :  — 
(a)  1568.  Printed  by  John  Allde. 

(6)  1587.  Pr.  Edw.  Allde.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1909.  Re- 
printed,  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iii. 

Impatient  Poverty.  Printed,  John  King,  1560.  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1907.  Reprinted,  J.  S.  Farmer,  "  Lost "  Tudor  Plays, 
1907. 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        143 

Albion  Knight.  Fragment  in  Chatsworth  library.  Reprinted, 

Shakespeare  Society  Papers,  i,  1844  ;   J.  S.  Farmer,  Malone 

Society  "  Collections,"  I,  iii. 
Trial  of  Treasure.    Printed,  Th.   Purfoote,  1567.    Facsimile, 

J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.   Reprinted,  J.  O.  Halliwell,  Percy  Society, 

28,  1850  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iii,  1874. 
WAGER,  LEWIS  :  Life  and  Repentance  of  Mary  Magdalene. 

John  Charlewood,  1566,  1567.    Facsimile  of  ed.  1567,  J.   S. 

Farmer,  1908.    Reprinted,  F.  I.  Carpenter,  1902.    New  ed. 

1904.   Discussion:  A.  Brandl,  Sh.  Jb.  39,  316-319  ;  R.  Imel- 

mann,  Archiv,  iii,  209-211. 
WAPULL,  G. :  The  Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man,  1576.  Reprinted, 

Collier,  Illustrations  of  Pop.  Lit.,  1864,  ii,  4  ;  Ernst  Riihl,  Sh. 

Jb.  43  (1907). 
LUPTON,   T.  :    All  for   Money,  1578.    Pr.  Roger  Warde  & 

Richard  Mundee.   Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1910.    Reprinted, 

J.  O.  Halliwell-Phillipps,  Literature  of  the  16  and  17  Centuries 

illustrated,  1851  ;  Ernst  Vogel,  Sh.  Jb.  40,  1904. 
WAGER,   W. :    The  Longer  Thou  Livest  the  More  Fool 

Thou  Art.  Ed.  n.  d.  Reprinted,  A.  Brandl,  Sh.  Jb.  36,  1900. 
WAGER,  W. :  The  Cruell  Debtor.  (A  fragment  consisting  of 

a  single  leaf  is  in  the  British  Museum.) 
WOODES,  N. :  The  Conflict  of  Conscience,  1581.  Reprinted, 

J.  P.  Collier,  Roxburghe  Club,  1851  ("  Five  Old  Plays ")  ; 

Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  vi. 
The   Contention   Bet-ween   Liberality  and   Prodigality. 

1602.  Reprinted,  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  viii. 

II.  INTERLUDES  AFFECTED  BY  FOREIGN  MODELS 

A.   WORKS  AFFECTED  BY  CONTEMPORARY  LATIN  DRAMA  OF  THE 
CONTINENT 

Nice  Wanton.  Two  early  editions  : — 

(a)  Printed  by  John  King,  1560.    Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer, 

1909. 
(5)  Printed  by  John  Allde,  n.  d.    Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer, 

1908. 

Reprinted:  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ii,  1874  ;  Manly,  Specimens,  i, 
1897  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Dramatic  Writings  of  R.  W  ever  and  Th. 
Ingelend  (sic  !),  1905. 


144  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

INGELEND,  THOMAS  :  The  Disobedient  Child.  Printed,  Th. 
Colwell.  n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  J.  O. 
Halliwell,  Percy  Society,  23, 1848  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ii,  1874  ; 
J.  S.  Farmer,  Dram.  Writings  of  R.  Wever  and  Th.  Ingelend, 
1905.  Discussion :  F.  Holthausen,  Engl.  Stud.,  31  (1902),  90  ff. 

Prodigal  Son.  Fragment.  Reprinted,  Malone  Soc.  "  Collec- 
tions," I,  i,  27-30  ;  ii,  106,  107. 

GASCOIGNE,  G. :  The  Glass  of  Government,  1575.  Reprinted, 
W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Gascoigne's  Poems,  Roxburghe  Library,  1870, 
ii ;  Works  of  Gascoigne,  ed.  J.  W.  Cuuliffe,  vol.  ii  (in  press). 
Discussion :  E.  Arber,  "  Chronicle  of  the  Life,  Works,  and 
Times  of  Gascoigne,"  1868  ;  C.  H.  Herford,  "  Gascoigne's 
Glasse  of  Government,"  Engl.  Stud.,  ix,  1886,  201-209  ;  F.  E. 
Schelling,  "  The  Life  &  Writings  of  George  Gascoigne,"  1894. 

BALE,  JOHN  :  John,  King  of  England.  Cf .  Bibliography  to 
chapter  iii. 

B.    WORKS  BASED  ON  SCRIPTURAL  STORY 

Godly  Queen  Hester.  Printed,  Win.  Pickering  and  Th.  Hacket, 
1561.  Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier,  Illustrations  of  Early  Eng.  Pop. 
Lit.,  pt.  7,  1863  (50  copies)  ;  A.  B.  Grosart,  Misc.  of  Fuller 
Worthies  Library,  vol.  iv,  1873  (106  copies)  ;  W.  W.  Greg, 
Materialien,  v,  1904  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Six  Anonymous  Plays  (2d 
Series),  1906. 

King  Darius.  Two  early  editions  :  — 

(a)  1565.  Printed,  Th.  Colwell.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1909. 
(6)  1577.       "  Hugh  Jackson.       "       J.  S.        "        1907. 

Reprinted,  J.  O.  Halliwell-Phillipps,  1860  ;  A.  Brandl,  Quellen, 
1898. 

Jacob  and  Esau,  1568.  Printed,  Henry  Bynneman,  B.  M.  Fac- 
simile, Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ii,  1874  ;  J.  S. 
Farmer,  Six  Anonymous  Plays  (2d  Series),  1906.  Discussion: 
Mrs.  C.  C.  Slopes,  Athenreum,  Apr.  28,  1900,  pp.  538-540. 

GOLDING,  A. :  Abraham's  Sacrifice.  "  Written  in  French  by 
Theodore  Beza,  and  translated  into  English  by  A.  G.  Finished 
at  Powles  Belchamp  in  Essex,  the  xj.  of  August,  1575."  Re- 
printed, M.  W.  Wallace,  1907. 

C.    WORKS  BASED  ON  CLASSIC  STORY 

Thersites.  Ed.  n.  d.,  printed  by  John  Tysdale.  Facsimile,  H.  S. 
Ashbee,  1876.  Reprinted,  Haslewood,  Two  Interludes,  Rox- 


THE  INTERLUDE  IN  TRANSITION        145 

bnrghe  Club,  1820  ;  F.  J.  Child,  Four  Old  Plays,  1848  ;  Haz- 
litt,  Dodsley,  i,  1874.  Discussion :  W.  Creizenach,  Lit.  Central- 
blatt,  1899,  205  ;  F.  Holthausen,  Engl  Stud.,  31  (1902),  77. 

PIKKKING,  JOHN  :  Interlude  of  Vice  containing  the  History 
of  Horestes,  1567.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1910.  Reprinted, 
A.  Brandl,  Quellen,  1898. 

B(OWERS  ?),  R. :  Appiua  and  Virginia,  1575.  Facsimile,  J.  S. 
Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iv. 

PRESTON,  THOMAS  :  Cambises,  King  of  Persia.  Two  early 
editions  :  — 

(a)  Printed  by  John  Allde,  n.  d.  (licensed  1569). 
(6)        "        "   Edward  Allde,  n.  d.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer, 

1910. 

Reprinted,  Hawkins,  1773,  vol.  i  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iv,  Manly, 
Specimens,  i,  1897.  Discussion:  M.  P.  Tilley  ;  Sh.  &.  his  ridi- 
cule of  Cambises,  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  24  (1909),  244-247. 

EDWARDS,  RICHABD  :  Damon  and  Pithias.  Two  early  editions  : 
1571,  1582.  Facsimile  of  1571,  ed.  J.  S.  Farmer,  1908. 
Reprinted,  Dodsley,  Ancient  British  Drama,  1810.  Discussion  : 
Durand,  W.  Y.,  Jrl.  Germ.  Phil.,  iv,  348-355  ;  Mod.  Lang. 
Notes,  23,  131. 

D.    INTERLUDES  BASED  ON  ROMANTIC  STORY 

PHILLIP,  JOHN  :    Comedy  of  Patient  and  Meek  Grissell. 

Printed   by    Th.    Colwell,  n.  d.    Reprinted,  Malone  Society, 

1909. 
Calisto  and  Melibea.  Printed  by  John  Rastell,  n.  d.  Facsimile, 

J.   S.   Farmer,  1909.    Reprinted,  Hazlitt,   Dodsley,  i,  1874  ; 

Malone  Society,  19.    Discussion:  A.  S.  W.  Rosenbach,  "  The 

Influence  of  the  'Celestina'  in  the  Early  English  Drama." 

Sh.  Jb.  39  (1903),  43  ff. 

E.     COMEDIES    RETAINING    NOTEWORTHY    FEATURES    OP    THE 
INTERLUDE    FORM 

WILSON,  ROBERT  :  The  Cobbler's  Prophecy,  1594.  Reprinted, 

W.  Dibelius,   Sh.  Jb.  33,  1897.    The  Pedler's  Prophecy, 

1595. 
W(ILSON  ?)  R. :  Three  Ladies  of  London,  1584.  Reprinted, 

J.  P.  Collier,  Five  Old  Plays,  1851  ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  vi. 

Three  Lords  and  Three  Ladies  of  London,  1590.  Re- 


146  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

printed,  J.  P.  Collier,  Five  Old  Plays,  Roxburghe  Club,  1851 ; 
Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  vi.    Discussion  :  H.  Fernow,  "  The  Three 
Lords  and  Three  Ladies  of  London,"  Hamburg,  1885. 
A  Merry  Knack  to  Know  a  Knave,  1594.  Reprinted,  J.  P. 
Collier,  Five   Old  Plays,   Roxburghe    Club,  1851  ;    Hazlitt, 
Dodsley,  vi. 

NASH,  THOMAS  :  Summer's  Last  "Will  and  Testament,  1600. 
Reprinted,  Dodsley,  ed.  Collier  and  Hazlitt ;  "  Works  of 
Nash,"  ed.  A.  B.  Grosart,  vol.  vi,  1885  ;  ed.  R.  B.  McKerrow, 
vol.  iii,  1905. 

Grim,  the  Collier  of  Croyden,  "  or  The  Devil  and  his  Dame  ; 
with  the  Devil  and  St.  Dunstan  :  a  Comedy,  by  I.  T.,"  1662. 
(Ascribed  to  William  Haughton.)  Reprinted,  Dodsley,  edd. 
Reed,  Collier,  Hazlitt. 


CHAPTER  V 

CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY 

WHEN  the  germs  of  an  English  national  drama  first 
developed  into  conscious  life  amid  the  moribund  sur- 
vivals of  the  conventional  mystery  and  morality,  the 
new  element  was  still  quite  simple.  The  range  of  this 
incipient  comedy  was,  indeed,  little  broader  than  that 
of  the  performances  of  the  itinerant  mimi  and  jocula- 
tores  against  whom  the  f  ulminations  of  the  Church  had 
been  directed  in  centuries  past.1  The  authors  of  the 
secular  interpolations  from  which  the  true  English 
drama  may  be  said  to  spring  addressed  themselves,  like 
the  wandering  joculatores  or  jongleurs,  to  vulgar  audi- 
ences, and  they  treated  vulgar  themes.  The  second  v 
Shepherds'  Play  in  the  Towneley  cycle,  containing  the 
story  of  Mak;  the  different  versions  of  the  quarrel  be-  ' 
tween  Noah  and  his  wife;  the  crude  horse-play  of  the 
less  serious  moralities,  wherein  the  vice  belabors  his 
victims,  or  is  himself  beaten,  —  these  episodes  repre- 
sent the  most  vital  work  which  the  English  drama  at 
the  commencement  of  the  Renaissance  had  to  offer. 
Comedy  at  this  period  can  scarcely  be  said  to  possess 
intellectual  interest.  Its  appeal  was  almost  wholly 
physical.  The  writers  depended  for  the  amusement  of 
their  audiences  upon  the  farcical  presentation  of  ruf- 
fianism and  the  contortions  of  bodily  pain. 

The  changes  which  we  have  traced  through  the 
transitional  middle  years  of  the  Tudor  period  are  of 
1  Cf.  Chambers,  Mediaeval  Stage,  i,  31  ff  ;  ii.  Appendix  N. 


148  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

great  importance  as  evidences  of  a  striving  after 
broader  art,  but  they  produced  few  absolute  results. 
The  general  upheaval  in  letters  and  religion  altered 
somewhat  the  tone  of  comedy,  but  was  not  able  to 
effect  any  radical  reform  in  structure.  It  brought  in  a 
taste  for  serious  themes  and  introduced  experimentally 
certain  foreign  models,  but  the  drama  remained  de- 
pendent still  for  its  bone  and  sinew  upon  native  pre- 
renaissance  convention. 

At  the  beginning  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  English  drama 
as  represented  in  comedy  by  Heywood's  interludes  and 
in  more  serious  styles  by  "  Respublica,"  "  King  Darius," 
and  "Nice  Wanton,"  had  developed  as  far  as  it  could 
naturally  proceed  without  external  assistance  in  the 
way  of  structural  rules  and  models.  There  was  but  one 
source  whence  such  rules  might  come;  namely,  the 
comedy  and  tragedy  of  ancient  Rome.  Greek  drama 
^was  at  the  time  much  too  little  known  to  exert  influ- 
ence upon  the  popular  or  even  in  any  appreciable 
measure  upon  the  purely  academic  theatre. 

The  influence  of  Latin  drama  manifested  itself  dur- 
ing the  Elizabethan  age  under  several  conditions.  It 
might  come  direct;  that  is,  authors,  might  base  their 
work  immediately  upon  the  comedies  of  Plautus  and 
Terence,  or  the  tragedies  of  Seneca.  It  was  thus  that 
the  first  Latinizing  plays  in  England  were  produced. 
Beside  this  frank  imitation,  however,  which,  till  the  art 
of  literary  amalgamation  could  gradually  perfect  itself, 
was  inevitably  betrayed  by  the  clash  of  ancient  and 
modern  conceptions,  there  filtered  in  a  subtler  strain 
of  influence  by  way  of  the  classic  drama  of  Italy,  where 
Latin  plot  and  precept  had  already  been  largely  shifted 
into  accord  with  current  interests  and  views  of  life,  and 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      149 

lent  themselves,  therefore,  to  considerably  easier  ab- 
sorption. An  illustration,  probably  not  very  unfair, 
of  the  difference  in  effect  between  classical  influence 
when  exerted  immediately  and  when  transmitted  at 
second-hand  by  way  of  Italy,  may  be  obtained  by  con- 
trasting Shakespeare's  "Comedy  of  Errors,"  based 
directly  on  the  "Mensechmi "  of  Plautus  and  somewhat 
marred  by  stiffness,  with  the  graceful  intrigue  comedy 
in  the  sub-plot  of  "The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  where 
the  Latin  influence  reaches  the  same  poet  through  the 
medium  of  Ariosto's  "Suppositi." 

The  first,  fundamental  gift  of  Latin  drama  to  Eng- 
lish was  the  example  of  the  division  of  plays  into  acts  /' 
and  scenes,  a  practice  introduced  by  the  scholarly  Bale 
and  universalized  with  the  spread  of  classic  imitation. 
Inherently,  no  doubt,  this  seems  a  matter  of  small 
consequence.  Yet  no  student  of  the  floundering  transi- 
tional interludes  or  the  vast  amount  of  equally  floun- 
dering work  which  succeeded  them  can  fail  to  recog- 
nize in  it  precisely  the  kind  of  check  indispensable  at 
this  period  to  the  excessive  Elizabethan  exuberance 
and  uncertainty.  The  habit  of  building  plays  upon  a 
rigid  five-act  pattern  which  required  careful  planning 
beforehand,  and  put  a  very  strong  if  not  invariably 
effectual1  curb  on  the  chronic  impulse  to  addition  and 
divagation,  was  just  the  force  that  turned  dramatic 
production  into  a  regular  channel  where  it  might  pro-- 
gress  smoothly  and  consecutively.  Lacking  this  mould 
of  form,  the  drama  of  the  age  might  easily  have  proved 
as  devoid  of  restraint  and  conscious  purpose  as  was,  for 
instance,  the  Elizabethan  epic. 

Another  borrowing  from  general  classic  technique, 
likewise  introduced  by  Bale,  was  of  very  considerable 


150  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

consequence,  though  by  no  means  so  rapidly  or  thor- 
oughly assimilated  as  the  principle  of  act  division. 

/  This  was  the  recognition  of  a  definite  line  of  cleavage 
between  comedy  and  tragedy.  The  vagueness  with 
which  the  early  Elizabethan  dramatists,  and  many  even 
of  the  later  ones,  distinguish  between  the  uses  and  pur- 
poses of  the  two  types  is  sufficiently  well  known.  It 
was  the  natural  result  of  the  complete  absorption  of 
tragedy  in  comedy  which  characterized  the  later  moral- 
ity; and  the  less  responsible  playwrights  remained 
satisfied  till  nearly  the  end  of  our  period  with  hetero- 
geneous medleys  which  they  might  at  will  term  comi- 
cal tragedies  or  tragical  comedies.  All  the  features  in 
this  contamination  which  made  for  realism  and  legiti- 
mate variety  persisted,  and  they  contributed  largely 
to  the  vitality  of  the  dramatic  product.  But  the  study 
of  ancient  models  confirmed  in  each  of  the  progressive 
writers  the  realization,  prerequisite  to  serious  theatri- 
cal criticism  and  practice,  that  essentially  comedy  is 
one  thing  and  tragedy  another.  The  complete  acqui- 
sition of  this  necessary  lesson  is  probably  best  wit- 
nessed in  the  mature  procedure  of  Shakespeare  and 
the  well-weighed  theory  of  Ben  Jonson.  But  through 
the  whole  evolution  of  dramatic  method,  from  the 
groping  indecision  of  Sackville,  Edwards,  and  Udall  to 
the  conscious  mastery  of  the  last  great  Elizabethans, 
the  fundamental  conception  of  the  peculiar  nature  of 
/  *•  comedy  and  of  tragedy  is,  like  the  terms  themselves, 
an  undisputed  heritage  from  the  Latin  stage. 

The  introduction  of  classical  models  broadened  the 

fi  range  of  the  drama  as  much  as  it  developed  dramatic 
art.  From  Plautus  and  Terence  the  English  comic 
writers  learned  to  refine  their  native  buffoonery  by  the 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      151 

cultivation  of  a  more  intellectual  species  of  wit,  enrich- 
ing the  clownage  of  plebeian  life  by  the  addition  of 
those  laughable  characters  and  incidents  which  arise 
amid  more  complex  societies.  Civic  types  came  more 
and  more  to  replace  the  old  ethical  abstractions  and 
unlocalized  Merry  Andrews.  Yet  the  generalizing 
tendency  of  the  interlude  remained  happily  strong 
enough  to  offset  the  contracted  scope  and  inherent  su- 
perficiality of  city  comedy,  as  it  flourished  in  ancient 
Rome  and  later  on  the  English  Restoration  stage.  So 
well,  indeed,  did  the  native  and  classical  elements 
blend  that  few  Elizabethan  comedies  are  notably  lack- 
ing, either  in  broad  human  application  or  in  realistic 
discrimination  of  the  social  types.  On  the  one  hand,  we 
see  the  old  native  clown  individualized  and  intellec- 
tualized  in  Falstaff ;  on  the  other,  we  find  the  soulless 
miles  gloriosus  humanized  in  Bobadill. 

Small  as  are  the  merits  of  the  Roman  comedianir 
in  point  of  invention  and  originality,  their  influence 
broadened  very  notably  the  narrow  scope  of  the  inter- 
lude. From  Terence  and  Plautus  Elizabethan  drama- 
tists obtained  several  new  types  of  plot  which  for  them  "1 
possessed  a  freshness  long  vanished  from  the  few  hack- 
neyed morality  themes,  and  not  really  acquired  by  any 
of  the  experiments  of  the  transitional  interlude.  Sev- 
eral of  the  richest  veins  of  Tudor  comedy  were  struck 
in  the  direct  line  of  classic  imitation,  and  the  less  patent 
results  of  the  same  classicizing  tendency  were  even 
more  intrinsically  important.  The  assimilation  of 
Latin  plot  material,  by  doubling  at  a  leap  the  struc- 
tural resources  of  the  English  dramatist,  made  possi- 
ble endless  permutations  and  combinations,  and  stim- 
ulated the  development  of  many  new  sorts  of  intrigue 


152  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

which  would  otherwise  have  remained  unsought  and 
unsuspected.  In  tracing,  therefore,  the  influence  of 
Latin  comedy,  the  critic  can  ill  afford  to  limit  his 
consideration  to  such  obvious  derivatives  as  "The 
Comedy  of  Errors"  and  "The  Alchemist."  He  must 
heed  also  the  more  delicate  affinities  which  show  the 
example  of  Plautus  -  Terence  to  have  been  a  neces- 
sary preparation  even  for  the  romantic  plays  of  "The 
Merchant  of  Venice"  and  "A  Midsummer  Night's 
Dream." 

And  though,  during  the  culminating  period  of  dra- 
matic progress,  the  years  of  Shakespeare's  prime,  the 
self-proclaimed  classical  spirit  in  Jonsonian  comedy 
stands  for  restraint  and  self-containment  as  against 
the  genial  but  ungoverned  diffusiveness  of  the  more 
popular  school,  it  must  be  remembered  that  both  in 
comedy  and  in  tragedy  the  sterner  lessons  of  classic 
reserve  were  learned  rather  from  Latin  prose  and  verse 
theorists  than  from  the  actual  procedure  of  the  Roman 
dramatists.  Indeed,  it  is  even  true  that  these  drama- 
tists themselves  contributed  to  that  exuberant  taste 
for  vivid,  if  irrelevant,  excitement  and  ornament  which 
"romantic"  plays  like  "As  You  Like  It"  and  "The 
Winter's  Tale"  rendered  orthodox, and  "classic"  plays 
like  "Every  Man  in  his  Humour"  attempted  vainly  to 
supplant.  The  opposition  is  less  justly  ascribed  to  a 
conflict  of  native  artlessness  with  ancient  rule  than  to 
that  of  two  mutually  supplementary  attitudes  toward 
art  which  coexisted  in  Roman  times  just  as  they  did  in 
•)  Elizabethan,  and  which  the  connotation  of  solidarity 
<,  involved  in  the  ordinary  use  of  the  word  "  classic  "  alto- 
gether obscures.  In  fact,  there  is  little  in  the  comedies 
of  Plautus  and  Terence  or  the  tragedies  of  Seneca 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY       153 

which  can  properly  be  called  classic  in  the  Jonsonian 
sense;  and  we  shall  see  that  far  the  most  certain  and 
permanent  results  of  the  influence  of  these  writers  upon 
early  English  drama  were,  in  comedy,  the  cultivation 
of  a  species  of  intrigue  much  more  elaborate  and  im- 
probable than  had  before  been  known,  and,  in  tragedy, 
the  birth  of  melodrama. 

The  motif  of  mistaken  identity,  which  the  Latin 
comic  dramatists  had  so  over-used,  is  put  to  equally  hard 
though  more  varied  service  on  the  Elizabethan  stage. 
InLyly's  "  Mother  Bombie,"  in  "The  Supposes,"  "The 
Comedy  of  Errors,"  and  a  dozen  other  plays  of  the  late 
sixteenth  century,  it  furnishes  the  backbone  of  the  plot. 
Moreover,  it  was  undoubtedly  the  force  of  classic  pre-  » 
cedent  rather  than  the  spiritless  mumming  of  the  inter- 
ludes which  gave  rise  to  the  extraordinary  Elizabethan 
love  of  stage  disguise  and  masquerade  and  continued  it 
to  the  end  of  the  Jacobean  period.  The  intricacy  of  the 
Latin  fable,  resting  usually  upon  a  tissue  of  mutual 
deceit  and  misunderstanding,  appears  to  have  had  a 
peculiar  zest  for  the  English  comic  writers  after  the 
long  vain  efforts  of  the  interlude  to  escape  from  the 
threadbare  simplicity  of  the  morality  plots.  It  is  to  be 
regarded  as  a  testimony  to  the  strength  of  Terentian 
example  that,  after  about  1575,  Elizabethan  comedy 
tends  normally  toward  excessive  convolution  of  struc- 
ture, in  the  most  marked  contrast  to  the  extreme 
tenuity  of  the  traditionary  native  model.  This  love  of 
a  tangled  skein  of  incident  and  character,  even  to  the 
detriment  of  dramatic  effectiveness,  can  be  followed 
from  Lyly's  plays  through  many  of  Shakespeare's,  and 
perhaps  reaches  its  climax  in  the  dizzying  maze  of  de- 
ception, misunderstanding,  and  cross  purpose  which 


154  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

bewilder  the  reader  of  "Wily  Beguiled"  and  Chap- 
man's "All  Fools." 

Of  the  great  popularity  of  the  Latin  comedies  during 
the  sixteenth  century  many  evidences  survive,  though 
it  was  not  till  about  the  middle  of  the  century  that 
they  began  obviously  to  influence  the  vernacular  Eng- 
lish drama.  Terence  had,  indeed,  retained  his  hold 
upon  the  reading  public  throughout  the  dark  ages,  and 
had  inspired  directly  a  number  of  imitative  dramas 
such  as  those  of  the  German  nun  Hroswitha  of  Ganders- 
heim  in  the  tenth  century,  and  the  productions  of  the 
great  German-Latin  school  in  the  late  fifteenth  and  six- 
teenth. The  work  of  this  last  group,  largely  because  of 
its  religious  and  political  bias,  was  considerably  more 
immediate  in  its  effect  on  English  drama  than  was  its 
Latin  source,  and  it  has  been  alluded  to  already  in  the 
connection  in  which  it  properly  belongs  as  a  variant 
influence  in  the  development  of  the  later  interlude. 

The  discovery  of  the  twelve  lost  comedies  of  Plautus, 
in  1427,  raised  the  fame  of  that  dramatist  to  a  full 
equality  throughout  learned  Europe  with  the  tradi- 
tional repute  of  Terence,  and  the  subsequent  influence 
of  the  two  poets  upon  English  dramatic  evolution  is  vir- 
tually identical.  The  plays  of  each  were  read  con- 
stantly during  the  entire  sixteenth  century  in  schools 
and  colleges;  and  in  the  Latin  original  they  were  not 
infrequently  acted,  sometimes  as  academic  exercises 
very  much  in  the  manner  still  continued  in  the  annual 
performances  at  Westminster  School,  at  other  times 
with  less  definitely  educational  intent. 

Several  interesting  allusions  prove  the  early  vogue  of 
Plautus  with  the  courtly  English  public  before  which 
the  interludes  were  ordinarily  presented,  —  the  public, 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY       155 

that  is,  whose  taste  was  during  the  early  Tudor  period 
the  determining  factor  in  the  evolution  of  dramatic 
types.  Thus  Holinshed's  Chronicle  bears  witness  to  this  S 
juxtaposition  of  a  play  of  Plautus,  presumably  acted 
in  the  original,  with  one  of  the  disguisings  so  popular  in 
connection  with  interludes.  The  occasion  was  a  state 
entertainment  of  Henry  VIII,  in  the  great  hall  at 
Greenwich,  May  7, 1520:  "Into  this  chamber  came  the 
king,  and  the  queene,  with  the  hostages,  and  there  was 
a  goodlie  comedie  of  Plautus  plaied;  and  that  doone, 
there  entered  into  the  chamber  eight  ladies  in  blacke 
veluet  bordered  about  with  gold  ...  &  tired  like  the 
Aegyptians  verie  richlie."  (Holinshed,  ed.  1808,  iii, 

635,  636.)  v^4+***4+tft  * 

A  passage  in  Sir  Thomas  More's  "Utopia"  (1516)  is  i 
significant  both  for  its  picturing  of  the  circumstances 
of  Plautine  theatrical  presentation,  and  because  of  its 
plea  for  the  absolute  discrimination  of  comedy  from  ' 
tragedy:  "Or  els,  whyles  a  commodye  of  Plautus  is 
playinge,  and  the  vyle  bondemen  skoffynge  and  try- 
felynge  amonge  themselfes,  yf  yowe  shoulde  sodenlye 
come  vpon  the  stage  in  a  philosophers  apparrell,  and 
reherse  owte  of  'Octauia'  the  place  wherin  Seneca 
dysputeth  with  Nero;  had  it  not  bene  better  for  yowe 
to  haue  played  the  domme  persone,  then  by  rehersynge 
that,  which  serued  nother  for  the  tyme  nor  place,  to 
haue  made  suche  a  tragycall  comedye  or  gallymal- 
f reye  ?  For  by  bryngynge  in  other  stuffe  that  nothynge 
apperteyneth  to  the  presente  matter,  yowe  must  nedys 
marre  and  peruert  the  play  that  ys  in  hande,  thoughe 
the  stuffe  that  yowe  brynge  be  muche  better."  l 

1  Utopia,  Robynson's  translation,  ed.  J.  H.  Lupton,  Oxford, 
1895,  98  f. 


156  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Certainly  Plautus  receives  here  very  left-handed 
praise;  and  it  must  be  admitted  that  the  constant 
predilection  of  Elizabethan  drama  in  favor  of  "  bryng- 
ynge  in  other  stuffe  that  nothynge  apperteyneth  to 
the  presente  matter,"  together  with  the  traditions  of 
More's  own  participation  in  such  amateur  gallimau- 
freys  lends  point  to  the  suspicion  that  his  allusions 
to  Plautus  and  Seneca  are  rather  due  to  the  desire  of 
a  neat  classical  illustration,  than  the  result  of  observa- 
tion of  actual  performances. 

No  English  translation  of  Plautus  is  known  previous 
to  the  version  of  the  "  Mensechmi "  by  W.  W.  in  1595 ;  but 
a  rendering  of  the  "  Andria"  of  Terence  had  appeared 
as  early  as  1497,  and  it  was  reprinted  at  least  three 
times  before  the  end  of  the  year  1588  (1510,  1520  ? 
1588),  while  a  very  special  personal  interest  attaches 
to  an  anthology  representing  parts  of  three  Terentian 
comedies :  "  Floures  for  Latine  speakyng  .  .  .  selected 
and  gathered  oute  of  Terence,  and  the  same  translated 
into  englyshe  .  .  .  compiled  by  Nicolas  Udall." 

The  most  elementary  and  not  improbably  the  earli- 
est experiment  at  introducing  upon  the  native  stage 
the  much-admired  devices  of  Roman  comedy  appears 
in  the  undated  "new  Enterlued  for  Chyldren  to  playe 
named  lacke  lugeler,"  which  was  licensed  for  pub- 
lication during  the  year  beginning  July  22,  1562,  but 
was  probably  extant  in  manuscript  at  least  a  decade 
before.  The  author  of  this  piece  feels  himself  to  be  an 
innovator,  and  he  states  his  objects  frankly  in  a  pro- 
logue: — 

"  In  this  manner  of  making  [t.  e.,  in  comedy]  Plautus  did  excel 

Wherefore  this  maker  delighteth  passingly  well 
To  follow  his  arguments,  and  draw  out  the  same." 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      157 

And  he  admits  with  a  candor  which  might  well  be 
imitated  by  more  homiletic  comedians  the  purely 
ludicrous  intention  of  the  play,  — 

"not  worth  an  oyster  shell, 
Except  percase  it  shall  fortune  to  make  you  laugh  well." 

The  story  of  this  farce,  which  does  not  extend  be- 
yond the  length  of  a  single  act,  is  derived  avowedly 
from  the  first  scene  of  the  "  Amphitruo,"  but  all  the  de- 
tails of  characterization  and  setting  are  as  typically 
English  as  anything  in  the  native  drama.  This  early 
excursion  into  the  foreign  field  illustrates  well  what  is 
throughout  the  salient  and  determining  feature  in  the 
progress  of  Tudor  drama,  —  the  essential  predominance 
in  all  plays  which  truly  represent  popular  interest  of 
the  domestic,  national  spirit  over  the  alien  influences, 
however  numerous  and  freely  introduced.  It  is  only, 
indeed,  when  the  student  comes  to  weigh  carefully  the 
results  of  the  exotic  importations  of  the  mid-century 
that  he  is  likely  to  comprehend  fully  the  strong  and 
permanent  hold  which  the  mystery  and  morality 
species  had  acquired  upon  the  whole  English  drama. 
It  is  an  indubitable  truth  that  the  Elizabethan  stage 
could  not  have  evolved  the  self-conscious  and  varied 
art  form  which  it  produced  without  tutelage  from  Latin 
technique  and  the  assimilation  of  much  new  material. 
But  it  is  a  truth  yet  more  remarkable  that  none  of  the 
forces  from  abroad,  Latin,  Italian,  French,  German, 
or  Spanish,  was  able  in  the  case  of  any  normal  Eliz- 
abethan play  to  supplant  or  seriously  diminish  the  na- 
tive tone  of  the  character  portrayal  and  atmosphere, 
till  the  Jacobean  decline  had  well  set  in.  The  author  of 
"Jack  Juggler"  has  accomplished,  apparently  uncon- 
sciously and  inevitably,  that  complete  translation  of 


158  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

his  remote  theme  into  terms  of  contemporary  life  and 
interest,  which  for  a  modern  playwright  would  be  the 
hardest  of  all  tasks.  The  Sosia  of  Plautus  is  reincar- 
nated in  the  page,  Jenkin  Careaway,  as  vivid  a  local 
type  as  the  most  sternly  national  art  could  produce, 
while  the  same  blind  force  of  natural  selection  replaces 
Mercury  by  the  mischievous  gamin,  Jack  Juggler.  The 
other  figures  —  Master  Bongrace  and  his  wife,  Dame 
Coy,  and  the  maid,  Alison  Trip-and-go  —  can  hardly 
be  said  to  owe  even  the  first  suggestion  to  Plautus 's 
Amphitryon,  Alcmene,  or  Bromia.1  The  real  English 
family  setting,  once  outlined,  develops  itself  in  this 
sketch,  as  in  "Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  "Gammer 
Gurton's  Needle,"  and  many  another  superficially 
classicizing  play,  —  not  from  any  special  realistic 
talent  or  intention  on  the  author's  part,  but  by  reason 
of  the  close  intertwining  of  drama  and  native  life, 
which  was  the  supreme  heritage  prepared  by  the  mys- 
tery, the  morality,  and  the  interlude  for  the  Elizabethan 
theatre. 

"Ralph  Roister  Doister"  is  probably  the  most  en- 
lightening illustration  extant  of  the  influence  of  Latin 
precedent  upon  English  comic  practice.  The  date  of 
this  piece  remains  in  doubt,  conjectures  ranging  over 
the  period  between  1534  and  1552,  though  the  weight 
of  probability  seems  still  to  incline  toward  the  conven- 
tional ascription  of  the  work  to  the  years  of  Udall's 
mastership  at  Eton  school  (1534-1541).  It  is  hardly  an 
accident  that  the  author  of  this  "first  regular  English 
comedy  "  should  be  a  writer  whom  we  know  from  other 

1  This  play  has  been  explained  as  a  travesty  of  the  Roman  doc- 
trine of  transubstantiation.  See  F.  S.  Boas  in  Cambridge  History  of 
English  Literature,  vol.  v,  120. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY     159 

evidences  to  have  been  most  actively  interested  both 
in  the  classical  and  in  the  native  English  theatre.  In 
1533  he  was  concerned  in  a  pageant  performed  at 
Anne  Boleyn's  coronation;  in  the  following  year  he 
published  his  Terentian  translations.  In  1554,  a  letter 
of  Queen  Mary,  dated  Dec.  3,  praises  his  past  diligence 
"  in  setting  foorth  of  Dialogues  and  Enterludes  before 
us  for  our  regell  disports  and  recreacion,"  and  calls 
upon  the  Master  of  the  Revels  to  give  him  free  use  of 
royal  property  for  such  performances  as  he  "  myndeth 
hereafter  to  she  we."  l 

"Roister  Doister"  is  probably,  after  "The  Comedy 
of  Errors,"  the  most  careful  imitation  of  Plautine  drama 
produced  during  the  sixteenth  century  in  the  English 
vernacular  ;  but  it  cannot  be  regarded,  like  Shake- 
speare's youthful  farce,  as  in  any  serious  degree  an 
adaptation  of  a  particular  Roman  play.  UdalFs  know- 
ledge of  classic  theory  and  practice,  immensely  broader 
and  better-digested,  of  course,  than  that  of  the  young 
Shakespeare,  is  everywhere  corrected  by  his  equally 
intimate  acquaintance  with  native  types  and  theatrical 
requirements.  The  professional  supervisor  of  inter- 
ludes to  Queen  Mary's  court  stood  in  no  danger, 
schoolmaster  though  he  was,  of  producing  a  closet 
drama,  or  satisfying  himself  with  a  mere  antiquarian 
revival.  The  reader  feels  himself  everywhere  in  the 
world  pictured  by  the  ancient  comic  dramatists,  —  this 
is,  indeed,  the  most  remarkable  quality  in  the  work,  — 
and  he  is  reminded  by  incidents  and  figures  now  of  the 
"Miles  Gloriosus,"  now  of  other  plays;  but  these  ana- 
logies will  not  bear  pressing.  The  slightest  comparison 
shows  that  Roister  Doister  differs  radically  from 
»  See  Loaeley  MSS^  ed.  A.  J.  Kempe.  1836. 


160  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Pyrgopolinices,  both  in  his  character  and  in  his  adven- 
tures; while  Merry  greek,  though  inevitably  suggestive 
of  the  Latin  parasite,  has  little  actual  affinity  to  any 
representative  of  the  type.  With  the  other  characters 
the  reminiscence  of  specific  classic  models  almost  en- 
tirely disappears,  though  the  general  flavor  of  classic 
"atmosphere"  does  not.  Udall  has  not  attempted  in 
"Roister  Doister"  to  imitate  any  special  Roman 
comedy,  —  not  even  in  the  free  way  in  which  Shake- 
speare imitates  the  "Mensechmi,"  or  the  author  of 
"The  Birth  of  Hercules  "  the  "  Amphitruo." l  Rather, 
he  has  evolved  an  entirely  independent  English  comedy 
in  classic  style.  He  has  adopted  consistently  the  ancient 
rules  of  act  and  scene  division,  and  he  has  tried 
throughout  to  build  up  his  play  in  harmony  with  the 
classical  and  scholarly  conception  of  the  nature  of  com- 
edy, seeking  amusement  rather  in  the  display  of  clevef 
urbane  wit  and  the  baiting  of  fools  and  dupes  than  in 
farcical  accident  or  rustic  clownage.  But  in  the  work- 
ing out  of  this  design,  Udall  shows  nearly  as  much  of 
the  practical  playwright  as  of  the  theoretical  innovator. 
His  classical  type-figures  —  the  vain-glorious  fool,  the 
self-seeking  busy-body,  the  desirable  widow — absorbed 
from  the  native  conventions  of  the  interlude  and  from 
the  ordinary  life  of  the  day  qualities  which  differen- 
tiate them  wholly  from  the  characters  of  Plautus. 

As  the  dramatic  crises  approach,  moreover,  the  poet 
yields  to  the  savage  native  demand  for  a  ruder  species 
of  excitement  than  mere  words  and  irony  can  produce. 
Ignoring  classic  proprieties,  he  subjects  his  braggart 
Roister  to  the  same  rough  handling  which  the  braggart 

1  See  the  very  valuable  edition  of  The  Birth  of  Hercules  (MS.  ca. 
1610)  prepared  by  M.  W.  Wallace,  1903. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      161 

Watkyn  of  the  Digby  play  *  had  received,  and  which 
formed  the  main  comic  resort  of  many  an  interlude. 
For  an  illustration  of  the  difference  between  the  real 
classic  drama,  even  in  its  Plautine  crudity,  and  Udall's 
fortunately  semi-barbarized  adaptation,  one  has  only 
to  compare  the  humiliation  of  Pyrgopolinices  ("Miles 
Gloriosus,"  V,  i)  with  that  of  Roister.  Much  injury 
may  be  done  to  historical  perspective  by  emphasizing 
the  indubitable  classic  tone  of  "Ralph Roister Doister" 
to  the  entire  disregard  of  the  play's  legitimate  connection 
with  earlier  English  drama.  Udall  was,  in  respect  of 
one  side  of  his  varied  genius,  a  direct  continuator  of 
the  work  of  Hey  wood;  and  it  is  the  special  distinction 
of  his  play,  not  simply  that  it  embodies  the  careful  art 
form  and  intellectual  intrigue  of  Latin  comedy,  but 
that  it  establishes  them  as  necessary  constituents  of  the 
most  advanced  and  characteristic  native  drama.  Sev- 
eral of  the  English  types  represented  first  in  this  com- 
edy play  prominent  parts  on  the  later  stage,  one  of  the 
most  vivid  being  the  toothless  old  nurse,  Marjorie 
Mumblecrust,  much  given  to  chattering  and  quarrel- 
ling, who  will  not  stick  for  a  kiss  with  such  a  gay  gen- 
tleman as  Roister  Doister,  but  comes  anon  at  the  first 
offer  of  the  salutation.  Shakespeare's  "Romeo  and 
Juliet"  and  Marlowe's  "Dido"  add  few  new  touches  to 
this  figure. 

A  very  interesting  contrast  is  afforded  by  the  com- 
parison of  "Roister  Doister"  with  the  comedy  which 
it  is  usual  to  regard  as  its  most  immediate  successor. 
" Gammer Gurton's  Needle"  was  published  in  1575  as 
played  "not  longe  ago  in  Christes  Colledge  in  Cam 
bridge,"  and  written  by  a  "Mr.  S.  Mr.  of  Art."  The 
1  Cf.p.  24. 


162  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

author  has  been  variously  identified  as  Dr.  John 
Bridges,  Dr.  John  Still,  and  latterly,  with  great  show  of 
probability,  as  William  Stevenson.1  If  the  last  ascrip- 
tion is  correct,  the  comedy  can  be  referred  pretty  cer- 
tainly to  the  year  1559-1560,  under  which  date  the 
college  records  of  Christ's  note  the  expenditure  of  5s. 
at  the  acting  of  "Mr.  Stevenson's  plaie."  In  any  case 
the  work  probably  antedates  July  22,  1563,  when  Th. 
Colwell,  the  future  publisher,  registered  what  appears 
to  be  the  same  play  under  the  title  of  "Dyccon  of 
Bedlam." 

It  is  a  striking  circumstance  that,  whereas  the  peru- 
sal of  "Roister  Doister"  impresses  the  student  above 
all  else  with  a  sense  of  that  play's  classical  restraint 
and  careful  attention  to  foreign  rules  of  structure,  the 
reader  of  "Gammer  Gurton's  Needle"  feels  predomi- 
nantly the  native,  "romantic"  features  of  the  work. 
This  difference  of  impression  is  important  because  it 
results  almost  wholly  from  a  change  of  "atmosphere," 
and  not  from  any  essential  variation  in  the  dramatic 
method  or  the  comic  materials  employed  by  the  two 
authors.  "Gammer  Gurton's  Needle"  follows  the 
Latin  rules  of  form  not  a  whit  less  closely  than  "Roister 
Doister."  Both  plays  exemplify  with  equal  care  the 
well-articulated  five-act  division,  the  ancient  practice 
of  beginning  a  new  scene  with  the  arrival  of  each  new 
figure,2  the  ordinary  Roman  fixed  locale  representing  a 
street  before  several  houses,  and  the  limitation  of  the 
time  of  action  to  a  single  day.  On  the  other  hand,  it 
cannot  be  held  that  the  figures  of  "Roister  Doister," 
vaguely  reminiscent  as  they  continually  are  of  Latin 

1  See  H.  Bradley  in  Gayley's  Repr.  Engl.  Comedies,  197  ff. 
8  A  few  exceptions  to  this  rule  occur  in  both  plays. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      163 

comedy,  are  in  any  appreciable  measure  less  true  to  the 
real  life  of  London  than  are  those  of  "Gammer  Gur- 
ton"  to  the  English  village  society  which  that  comedy 
portrays.  The  difference  between  the  plays  arises  from 
a  subtler  cause.  It  shows  how  the  various  classic  im- 
portations, which  in  the  earlier  work  betray  their  for- 
eign origin  and  give  to  "Roister  Doister,"  in  spite  of 
its  really  English  plot,  a  rather  stiff  and  unfamiliar 
movement,  have  been  so  thoroughly  assimilated  in 
"Gammer  Gurton"  that  the  reader  nowhere  feels  them 
to  be  exotics.  That  twenty  years  —  probably  only 
ten  —  could  show  so  great  a  progress  is  one  of  the 
special  mysteries  of  Elizabethan  dramatic  transmu- 
tation. "  Gammer  Gurton's  Needle "  is  on  every 
true  analysis  a  native  English  play,  though  its  author 
has  learned  abroad  the  whole  of  his  technique.  In  deal- 
ing with  works  of  this  sort  we  have  to  do  not  with  for- 
eign, but  with  naturalized  influences. 

Several  of  the  characters  in  "Gammer  Gurton's 
Needle"  deserve  closer  study  than  can  be  asked  for 
many  of  their  predecessors  in  English  comedy.  The 
curate,  Doctor  Rat,  shows  one  of  the  most  popular  of 
the  old  literary  types,  the  vicious  priest,  in  the  very 
process  of  metamorphosis  into  his  equally  popular 
post-reformation  substitute,  the  knavish  but  jovial 
parson,  who  appears,  for  instance,  in  "  Misogonus," 
"Sir  John  Oldcastle,"  and  "The  Merry  Devil  of 
Edmonton."  In  the  central  figure  of  the  piece,  Diccon 
the  Bedlam,  a  merry -spirited  village  lago,  laying  plot 
upon  plot  with  no  other  purpose  than  the  gratification 
of  his  own  super-subtle  imagination,  English  drama 
received  the  very  finest  comic  creation  which  it  had  yet 
to  show. 


164  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

In  1566,  the  students  of  Gray's  Inn  gave  a  new  turn 
to  theatrical  development  by  acting  a  translation  of 
Ariosto's  Italian  comedy,  "Gli  Suppositi"  (The  Sub- 
stitutions), executed  by  one  of  their  own  number, 
George  Gascoigne,  and  inaccurately  entitled  "The 
Supposes."  Ariosto's  play,  first  produced  at  Ferrara  in 
1509,  was  the  direct  result  of  a  strong  revival  of  interest 
in  Latin  drama,  which  since  1486  had  manifested  itself 
throughout  northern  Italy  in  most  elaborate  perform- 
ances of  Plautine  and  Terentian  comedies.  The  "Sup- 
positi" occupies  much  the  same  relation  to  Plautus  in 
point  of  originality  as  does  "Ralph  Roister  Doister." 
Most  of  the  incidents  and  stock  types  are  suggestive  of 
the  "Captivi"  or  other  plays,  while  the  actual  working 
out  of  details,  both  of  plot  and  character,  is  the  author's 
own.  But  whereas  the  English  comic  tradition,  upon 
which  the  writers  of  "Roister  Doister"  and  "Gammer 
Gurton's  Needle"  rely  for  their  individual  touches,  was 
hardly  able  to  raise  the  product  above  the  level  of 
farce,  Ariosto  has  overlaid  his  borrowed  framework 
V  with  an  intricate  romantic  love  story.  The  characters 
bear  for  the  most  part  Italian  names,  and  the  scene  is 
frankly  laid  in  Ferrara,  the  city  of  presentation .  It  is 
true  that  the  chief  figures  in  this  play,  as  in  "Roister 
Doister,"  belong  hi  general  to  the  ancient  types:  the 
garrulous  nurse,  the  aged  lover,  the  parasite,  the  schem- 
ing servant,  the  old  father.  But  these  have  become 
thoroughly  Italianate,  and  they  possess  all  the  sensual 
vividness  which  made  the  literature  of  the  Italian 
renaissance  so  objectionable  to  moralists  like  Ascham, 
and  so  irresistibly  seductive  to  English  lovers  of 
romance.  "The  Supposes"  inaugurates  the  taste  for 
Italian  character  and  plot  so  notably  exemplified  in 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN   COMEDY      165 

Shakespeare  and  all  his  great  contemporaries.  In  many 
of  the  later  instances,  to  be  sure,  this  taste  is  inspired  by 
mere  convention  and  affectation,  but  it  arose  because 
in  Gascoigne's  time  Italian  influence  was  able  to  give 
the  drama  a  romantic  charm  and  plot  interest,  attain- 
able neither  from  the  development  of  native  tendencies, 
nor  from  direct  imitation  of  the  Latin  masters. 

In  "Misogonus"  Italian  example  seems  responsible 
for  the  existence  of  another  early  English  comedy. 
This  interesting  work  is  extant  in  a  damaged  manu- 
script, signed  on  the  first  page:  "Laurentius  Bariona, 
Kettering,  1577."  The  names  of  Th.  Richardes  and 
Thomas  Warde,  of  whom  nothing  further  is  definitely 
known,  are  appended  to  the  Prologue,  with  precisely 
what  significance  is  not  clear.  Recent  proof  amounting 
almost  to  certainty  explains  the  Laurentius  Bariona 
(i.  e.,  Bar-jona)  of  this  piece  and  of  a  "  Cometographia," 
dated  likewise  at  Kettering  a  few  months  later,  as  a 
punning  Hebraism  for  Lawrence  Johnson,  who  pro- 
ceeded M.  A.  of  Christ's  College,  Cambridge  in  1577. 1 
It  has  been  customary,  on  the  strength  of  a  single  allu- 
sion of  no  great  importance,  to  refer  the  composition  of 
"Misogonus"  to  the  year  1560,  and  to  regard  L.  Bari- 
ona as  the  mere  transcriber;  but  wre  now  possess 
evidence  of  at  least  equal  weight,  thanks  to  the  acute 
inferences  of  Professor  Kittredge,  for  believing  Bariona- 
Johnson  the  original  author. 

It  is  interesting  to  think  of  "  Misogonus  "  as  an  aca- 
demic piece,  produced  after  the  lapse  of  fifteen  years 
by  the  same  Cambridge  Society  (Christ's)  before  which 
"Gammer  Gurton's  Needle"  had  been  performed.  At 
all  events,  comparison  of  the  two  plays  proves  a  con- 

1  See  G.  L.  Kittredge,  Journal  of  Germanic  Philology,  iii,  335. 


166  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

siderable  expansion  in  the  range  of  comedy.  On  the 
one  hand,  "Misogonus"  represents  a  return  to  the 
prodigal  son  theme  common  to  many  of  the  later  inter- 
ludes, such  as  "Nice  Wanton,"  "The  Disobedient 
Child,"  and  "The  Glass  of  Government."  Many 
scenes  of  crude  realism,  like  that  in  which  the  improvi- 
dent son  riots  in  the  tavern  with  Sir  John  the  Priest 
and  the  meretrix  Melissa,  belong  to  the  same  genre  as 
the  whole  of  "Gammer  Gurton."  But  to  enrich  these 
themes,  recourse  has  been  had  to  Italy  and  romance. 
The  nominal  scene  of  the  action  is  Laurentum,  though 
in  accordance  with  invariable  Elizabethan  practice 
characters  and  setting  have  been  completely  Angli- 
cized. None  of  the  suggestions  so  far  hazarded  con- 
cerning the  specific  source  of  the  Italian  plot  is  at  all 
ponvincing,  but  it  seems  safe  to  assume  that  it  was  not 
in  any  great  degree  the  invention  of  the  English  author. 
The  story  is  a  kind  of  converse  of  the  famous  Griseldis 
legend,  which  Petrarch  and  Boccaccio  made  illustrious, 
and  which  Chaucer's  "Clerkes  Tale"  introduced  to  a 
lasting  English  vogue.  The  husband  of  Griseldis  de- 
prives her  successively  of  their  two  infant  children, 
whom,  under  pretence  of  causing  to  be  slain,  he  sends  to 
Bologna  to  be  brought  up  by  a  female  relative  (his  sis- 
ter in  Chaucer  and  Petrarch),  whence  he  later  restores 
them  unexpectedly  to  the  patient  mother.  In  "Mis- 
ogonus," it  is  the  wife,  who,  upon  giving  birth  to  twin 
sons,  despatches  the  elder  secretly  to  her  brother  at 
Apollonia  (or  Polonia;  i.  e.,  Bologna  ?).  There  the  boy, 
Eugonus,  grows  to  manhood  unknown,  and  is  at  last 
restored  near  the  end  of  the  piece  in  order  to  comfort 
his  paient  and  punish  the  insolence  of  his  vicious 
younger  brother  (Misogonus),  the  prodigal  of  the  play. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      167 

"  Misogonus  "  is  a  work  of  too  mixed  a  nature  to  af- 
ford easy  reading;  but  the  individual  scenes  have  con- 
siderable power,  and  the  play  marks  a  distinct  step 
onward  in  dramatic  progress.  The  realistic  tavern 
scenes;  the  portrayal  of  the  misguided  "filius  domesti- 
cus";  and  the  characters  of  Cacurgus,  the  intriguing 
"Will  Summer," -— half  clown,  half  parasite,  —  of  the 
various  servants  of  Misogonus  and  his  father,  of  Me- 
lissa, and  Sir  John;  the  good  rustic  figures  of  Codrus  the 
farmer  and  his  wife  Alison,  Isbell  Busbey,  and  Madge 
Caro,  belong  all  to  the  type  of  native  farce  remodelled 
on  classical  lines  of  which  "Roister  Doister"  is  the 
most  correct  and  "Gammer  Gurton's  Needle"  prob- 
ably the  most  successful  example.  The  author  of  "  Mis- 
ogonus" has,  however,  strained  his  play  to  include  a 
third  element  of  dramatic  interest  which  the  taste  o$ 
his  time  was  beginning  to  demand.  Besides  the  realis- 
tic portrayal  of  common  life  which  was  indigenous  on 
the  English  stage,  and  the  structural  method  which 
came  from  Rome,  he  has  recognized  the  need  of  a 
graceful  human  story,  and  he  appears  to  have  bor- 
rowed the  main  thread  of  his  plot  from  Italian  romance. 
If  the  reader  must  admit  that  these  elements  are  by  no 
means  perfectly  blended,  it  is  none  the  less  inevitable 
that  he  perceive  the  vigor  of  each  and  realize  that 
each  has  found  its  place  in  answer  to  a  real  dramatic 
want.  Barring  individual  genius  and  the  assimilative 
force  of  twenty  years  of  theatrical  practice,  "Miso- 
gonus" exemplifies  every  element  of  plot  and  every 
rule  of  structure  which  goes  to  make  up  such  a  play  as 
"The  Taming  of  the  Shrew." 

The  anonymous  play  of  "The  Bugbears"  shows 
Italian  influence  exerted  upon  the  Latin-English  type 


168  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  comedy  in  a  manner  neither  so  immediate  as  in  Gas- 
coigne's  confessed  translation,  nor  so  casual  as  in  "  Bar- 
iona's"  grafting  of  a  possibly  non-dramatic  romantic 
plot  upon  a  stock  of  native  farce.  "The  Bugbears"  is 
based  primarily,  and  in  parts  very  closely,  upon  "La 
Spiritata"  of  Ant.  Francesco  Grazzini  (d.  1583), but  its 
dependence  is  by  no  means  slavish.  Besides  altering 
the  names  of  his  characters,  the  author  of  the  English 
play  has  changed  the  comic  fable,  and  has  enriched  his 
work  by  importation  both  from  other  Italian  comedies 
such  as  "  Gl'  Ingannati "  and  the  "  Suppositi, "  and  also 
it  would  appear,  directly  from  Terence's  "Andria."  i 

Compared  with  "Misogonus,"  this  comedy  recom- 
mends itself  by  its  unified  and  well-managed  plot; 
compared  with  "The  Supposes,"  it  shows  a  freedom  in 
selection  and  variation  of  borrowed  material,  which 
forbids  us  to  regard  it  as  a  pure  exotic.  Historically,  it 
is  probably  less  important  than  either  of  these  pieces. 
Since  its  main  source,  "La  Spiritata,"  is  supposed  to 
have  been  first  printed  in  1561,  it  is  unlikely  that  it  will 
be  able  to  displace  "The  Supposes"  from  its  position 
..  as  the  first  English  adaptation  of  Italian  comedy.  Nor, 
on  the  other  hand,  does  it  manifest  the  juxtaposition 
of  native  and  foreign  elements,  which  renders  "Mis- 
ogonus" so  interesting  a  document  in  Elizabethan 
stage  history.  Intrinsically,  however,  "The Bugbears," 
which  treats  the  popular  Roman  theme  of  the  outwit- 
ting of  aged  greed  by  youthful  love,  is  certainly  one 
of  the  most  successful  products  of  Italian  adaptation. 
Less  purely  imitative  than  "The  Supposes,"  and  less 
awkwardly  transitional  than  "Misogonus,"  it  is  per- 
haps the  first  finished  English  comedy  of  its  species. 
In  its  principal  device  of  the  mock  conjurer  it  is  the 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      169 

forerunner  of  a  whole  group  of  Jacobean  plays,  such  as 
"The  Puritan,"  "The  Alchemist,"  and  "Albumazar." 
"Fedele  and  Fortunio,"  or  as  the  head-title  of  the 
extant  edition  has  it,  "The  pleasaunt  and  fine  con- 
ceited Comcedie  of  two  Italian  Gentlemen,  with  the 
merie  deuises  of  Captaine  Crack-stone,"  is  a  free  adap- 
tation of  "II  Fedele"  by  Luigi  Pasqualigo(1575),  and 
was  entered  on  the  Stationers'  Register,  November  12, 
1584.  This  play,  which  Collier  ascribed  to  Anthony 
Munday l  on  the  strength  of  a  dedication  signed  "A.  M.," 
seems  to  have  been  very  commonly  known  in  its  day, 
and  it  makes  fair  reading  still.  The  artificial  compli- 
cation of  love-plots,  the  clever  trifling  with  the  arts 
of  incantation  and  the  stock  figures  of  braggart  and 
pedant  hold  the  interest;  while  the  play  possesses  two 
adventitious  claims  to  attention  by  reason  of  its  em- 
ployment of  the  same  trick  through  which  Don  John 
deceives  Claudio  in  "  Much  Ado  About  Nothing,"  and 
by  its  neat  illustration  of  the  possibilities  of  the  Eliza- 
bethan upper,  or  balcony,  stage  in  connection  with  the 
fixed  Roman  street  scene. 

John  Lyly  is  the  first  dominating  personality  that 
confronts  the  historian  of  the  English  drama.  His  con- 
nection with  the  London  stage,  inaugurated  about  the 
year  1580,  and  rapidly  followed  by  the  appearance  of 
other  noteworthy  figures,  begins  a  new  era,  and  necessi- 
tates on  the  part  of  the  critic*  a  new  estimate  of  the  re- 
lation between  the  individual  dramatist  and  the  dra- 
matic type.  Hitherto,  the  playwrights  of  two  centuries, 
figures  often  nameless  and  generally  obscure,  present 

1  Chapman  has  a  better  claim.  See  Malone  Soc.  "  Collections," 
I,  221  ff. 


170  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

themselves  to  the  student  normally  and  properly  as 
exponents  of  one  strain  or  another  in  theatric  evolu- 
tion. Henceforth,  it  is  rather  the  play,  in  the  most 
conspicuous  and  important  cases,  which  becomes  sub- 
sidiary to  the  reflection  of  the  personality  and  char- 
acter of  the  poet.  Thus  judicial  interest  in  the  dra- 
matic species  gives  place  ordinarily  to  appreciation  of 
the  individual  dramatist.  Yet  it  is  by  no  means  wise 
at  this  point  to  disregard  the  old  threads  of  influence; 
for  if  it  be  true  that  they  grow  tangled  by  the  caprice 
of  personal  genius,  it  is  none  the  less  certain  that  these 
same  threads  can  still  be  traced  through  all  the  pro- 
cesses of  the  loom,  and  that  they  determine  by  their 
presence  or  absence  the  color  and  texture  of  the  result- 
ant fabric. 

The  eight  accepted  plays  of  Lyly  manifest  no  less 
certainly,  though  in  far  subtler  fashion  than  the  sim- 
pler works  with  which  we  have  been  dealing,  the  Latin 
influence  upon  English  comedy.  When  Lyly  wrote,  the  ... 
courtly  drama  with  which  he  allied  himself  had  already 
assimilated  the  technical  lessons  derived  from  the  prac- 
tice of  Plautus  and  Terence.  Scene  and  act  division, 
stock  types  like  the  parasite,  the  amiably  knavish 
"boy"  or  servant,  and  the  greedy  parent  were  estab- 
lished institutions  on  the  fashionable  stage;  and  Te- 
rentian  imitation  was  become  conventional,  if  not  spon- 
taneous. "Mother  Bombie,"  one  of  the  latest  of 
Lyly's  comedies  (ca.  1590),  is  a  remarkably  successful 
adaptation  of  the  Roman  comic  type  to  an  English 
setting.  The  four  old  men,  mutually  deceiving  and 
deceived;  the  three  pairs  of  lovers  taught  by  the 
pages  to  outwit  their  elders;  and  the  motive  of  infant 
substitution,  are  all  antique  borrowings  adjusted  to 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      171 

the  environment  of  Rochester,  and  vitalized  by  a  genu- 
inely English  humor.  This  play  depends,  like  its  Ro- 
man predecessors,  entirely  upon  the  involved  intrigue 
and  the  wit  of  the  dialogue;  and  it  indicates  the 
establishment  of  a  type  of  comedy  modelled  on  classic 
lines,  which,  though  far  from  being  adequately  expres- 
sive of  the  Elizabethan  dramatic  spirit,  yet  maintained 
itself  to  the  end  of  the  period. 

In  the  other  comedies  of  Lyly,  an  entirely  new  re- 
lation to  classical  sources  betrays  itself, — a  relation 
analogous  to  that  manifested  in  the  Roman  trage- 
dies of  Shakespeare  and  Ben  Jonson.  English  classic 
drama  here  emerges  from  its  period  of  conscious  pupil- 
ship.  At  this  epoch  the  lessons  derived  from  the  Latin 
playwrights  had  been  so  thoroughly  mastered  as  to  ap- 
pear almost  indigenous;  and  dramatists  who,  like  Lyly, 
give  a  general  adhesion  to  classic  rules  of  structure,  and 
ring  the  changes  on  such  popular  types  as  the  cunning 
witty  servant  or  the  pompous  braggart,  were  probably 
no  longer  seriously  mindful  of  their  debt.  Lyly's  con- 
fessed obligation  to  Roman  literature  is,  indeed,  more 
a  matter  of  content  than  of  form.  Coming  up  to  Lon- 
don about  1578  with  the  prestige  of  an  Oxford  M.  A. 
received  some  three  years  earlier,  Lyly  embarked  upon 
a  courtier's  career  under  the  influential  patronage  of 
Burghley  and  Burghley's  son-in-law,  the  Earl  of  Ox- 
ford. Successively,  he  achieved  social  fame  as  an  in- 
novator in  the  two  departments  of  fashionable  fiction 
and  fashionable  drama,  distinguishing  himself  in  both 
by  the  freshness  of  his  method  and  his  extraordinary 
tact  in  apprehending  and  fixing  the  momentary  taste 
of  society.  In  "Euphues"  (1578,  1580),  he  gave  form 
and  an  undeserved  degree  of  permanence  to  the  pre- 


172  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

vailing  aspiration  after  an  elaborate  artificial  proses 
rich  in  figure  and  conceit;  and  the  success  of  euphuism 
furnished  him  with  the  most  valuable  of  his  resources 
when,  soon  after  the  appearance  of  his  novel,  he  com- 
menced dramatist.  The  employment  of  prose  in  com- 
edy, purely  casual  in  Gascoigne's  translation  of  the 
"Suppositi,"  was  in  Lyly  a  deliberate  effort  at  utilizing 
a  special  asset  of  the  writer,  —  his  popular  euphuistic 
style. 

Lyly  soon  found  himself  in  a  position  closely  resem- 
bling that  which  John  Heywood  had  occupied  two  gen- 
erations earlier, — commissioned,  that  is,  to  offer  plays 
for  presentation  before  noble  audiences  by  the  boys' 
companies  of  Paul's  and  the  Queen's  Chapel.  Under 
these  circumstances  he  appears  to  have  labored  for  the 
attainment  of  two  principal  aims :  novelty  and  ephem- 
eral appropriateness.  As  a  professed  scholar,  catering 
to  a  public  whose  penchant  was  scholarism,  it  was 
nearly  inevitable  that  he  should  turn  to  the  classics  for 
his  inspiration.  From  the  Latin  comic  poets,  however, 
he  could  gain  little  of  what  he  particularly  sought. 
Plautus  and  Terence  had  been  already  laid  under  con- 
tribution, as  we  have  seen.  The  best  they  had  to  offer 
in  the  way  of  form  and  plot  had  become  far  too  familiar 
for  the  ambitious  innovator,  whose  business  it  was  to 
create  a  well-bred  sensation.  In  "Mother  Bombie" 
alone,  which  dates  probably  as  late  as  1589  or  1590, 
was  Lyly  content  to  stick  to  dramatic  precedent  and 
turn  out  a  correct  and  not  unconventional  comedy 
after  the  Terentian  model.  His  other  plays  are  marked 
by  a  striving  for  the  unique  and  graceful  at  whatever 
cost  to  the  plot;  and  the  qualities  which  he  required  he 
discovered  most  abundantly  among  the  non-dramatic 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      173 

classics.  In  ancient  tradition  and  history,  as  related 
by  writers  familiar  to  the  EJizabethans,  such  as  Pliny, 
Hyginus,  JSlian,  and,  above  all,  Ovid,  Lyly  had  at 
hand  a  wealth  of  material,  which,  in  addition  to  its 
unfading  daintiness,  its  comparative  novelty  on  the 
English  stage  and  its  tremendous  vogue  elsewhere,  pos- 
sessed the  transcendent  advantage  that  classic  my- 
thology was  in  his  day  the  universally  understood  lan- 
guage of  courtly  allegory  and  adulation. 

In  "Campaspe,"  which  was  probably  his  first  play, 
Lyly  was  content  with  the  simple  dramatization  of  an 
incident  in  the  life  of  Alexander  the  Great,  derived,  as 
Mr.  Bond  has  shown,  from  a  chance  anecdote  in  Pliny's 
Natural  History  (Bk.  35,  ch.  x),  and  from  Plutarch's 
Life  of  Alexander,  published  very  shortly  before  in 
North's  translation  (1579). l  For  the  deepening  of  the 
faint  picture  of  ancient  Athens  thus  secured,  the  poet 
very  artlessly  introduces  the  philosopher  Diogenes, 
dragged  periodically  upon  the  stage  in  his  tub  to  insult 
the  world-conqueror  or  abuse  his  fellow  citizens.  A 
third  independent  element  in  this  technically  crude 
piece  is  constituted  by  the  three  humorous  servants, 
Granichus,  Manes,  and  Psyllus,  who  are  borrowed 
from  the  current  Terentian  comedy  of  the  day. 

Fundamentally,  then,  the  important  classical  influ- 
ence in  "  Campaspe"  is  the  fruit  rather  of  the  quest  for 
novelty  than  of  artistic  conviction.  Lyly's  attitude  to 
his  sources  is  here  more  nearly  that  of  Pikering,  author 
of  the  transitional  medley  "Horestes,"  than  that  of 
UdalFs  critical  school.  Keenly  desirous  of  fresh  sub- 
jects, but  lacking  any  special  dramatic  theory,  Pikering 
and  Lyly  both  turned  naturally  to  the  great  magnet  of 
1  See  Lyly,  ed.  Bond,  ii,  806  ff. 


174  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

renaissance  study,  the  ancient  literatures,  and  took 
thence  what  was  their  most  obvious  superficial  need,  — 
an  interesting  fable.  This  fable  each  developed  some' 
what  roughly  and  without  great  evidence  of  individual 
dramatic  initiative,  after  the  fashion  of  his  day.  The 
difference  between  the  two  plays  is  no  false  measure  of 
the  progress  achieved  by  English  drama  under  classic 
guidance  between  the  years  1560  and  1580.  Pikering 
writes  in  a  variety  of  rime  forms  without  definite  act  or 
scene  division,  and  he  depends  for  comic  relief  upon 
passages  of  rustic  buffoonery  derived  from  the  morality 
convention.  Lyly ,  following  the  fashion  of  the  moment 
in  the  case  of  "  Campaspe  "  with  equal  docility,  divides 
his  play  into  acts  and  scenes  as  a  matter  of  course, 
though  he  shows  himself  ignorant  of  the  technical  ad- 
vantages of  this  structure;  and  for  the  desired  comic 
padding  of  his  romantic  drama,  he  resorts  as  natu- 
rally to  the  popular  Latin  theme  of  servant  trickery  as 
had  Pikering  to  the  old  native  clownage.  Instead  of 
the  rough  verse  of  "Horestes,"  Lyly  substitutes  prose 
of  a  highly  euphuistic  tone;  and  this,  the  only  techni- 
cal feature  of  "Campaspe"  which  can  at  all  be  termed 
original,  is  patently  the  result,  not  of  critical  dramatic 
theory,  but  of  the  author's  successful  practice  in  an- 
other branch  of  literature. 

The  six  plays  most  representative  of  Lyly's  indi- 
vidual dramatic  method  fall  naturally  into  two  groups. 
Three  of  them  — "Sapho  and  Phao"  (1582?),  "Endi- 
mion"  (1586  ?),  and  "Midas"  (1589  ?)  —  derive  their 
plots  from  Latin  mythology,  and  are  obviously  allegori- 
cal in  nature.  The  other  three— "  Gallathea  "  (1584  ?), 
"Love's  Metamorphosis"  (1588-1589),  and  "The 
Woman  in  the  Moon"  (1591?)  —  though  full  of  classic 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY     175 

reminiscence,  have  in  the  main  original  pastoral  plots,  , 
and  if  at  all  symbolic,  are  not  predominantly  or  con- 
tinuously so.  In  these  six  dramas,  Lyly  shows  a  genius 
as  fresh  and  at  the  same  time  as  fantastic  as  that  which 
he  had  earlier  displayed  in  the  prose  innovations  of 
"Euphues  ":  and  he  illustrates  a  new  phase  in  the  rela- 
tion between  the  English  stage  and  the  ancients.  In  a 
sense  Lyly  may  be  said  to  have  entirely  reversed  the 
procedure  of  the  early  sponsors  of  classic  influence. 
The  mission  of  Udall  and  his  fellows  had  been  to  bring 
the  structure  of  English  drama  into  conformity  with 
Latin  rule.  Lyly  takes  upon  himself  the  bolder  task  of 
forcing  Latin  story  into  harmony  with  native  taste  and 
contemporary  interest;  and  his  plays,  therefore,  while 
evidencing  everywhere  the  domestication  of  the  formal 
lessons  of  Latin  dramaturgy,  show  further  that  the 
period  of  close  discipleship  to  Rome  had  passed,  and 
that  the  English  stage  was  now  quite  capable  of  aggres- 
sive assertion  of  its  peculiar  interests. 

The  general  interpretation  of  two  of  Lyly's  allegori- 
cal comedies  is  hardly  subject  to  doubt,  and  has  not  yet 
been  questioned  by  any  sane  critic.  "  Sapho  and  Phao  " 
is  very  obviously  a  flattering  allusion  to  the  matri-  • 
monial  fiasco  .between  Elizabeth  and  the  Due  d'Alen- 
cpn,  which,  after  dragging  through  a  number  of  years, 
ended  suddenly  in  nothing  on  February  6,  1582,  — 
about  a  month,  it  seems,  before  the  play  was  presented. 
Even  more  unmistakably  "  Midas  "  is  a  personal  satire 
directed  against  the  folly,  rapacity,  and  cruelty  of 
Philip  II  of  Spain,  and  prompted  by  the  general  tri- 
umph over  the  debdcle  of  the  Armada  in  1588. 

It  is  unfortunate,  but  not  unnatural,  that  the  under- 
standing of  "Endimion,"  the  most  intricate  and  pi- 


176  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

quant  of  these  allegorical  plays,  is  at  present  obstructed 
by  the  existence  of  four  rival  interpretations,  which 
are  mutually  contradictory,  and  which  seem  to  me  all 
super-subtle.  In  order  to  walk  straight  through  the 
maze  of  conjecture  and  parti-pris,  which  thus  besets 
the  student  of  this  comedy,  it  is  necessary  to  keep  in 
mind  the  reasonable  limitations  and  the  probable  pur- 
poses of  courtly  allegory.  Lyly's  procedure  in  "Sapho 
and  Phao"  and  in  "Midas"  certainly  bears  out  inher- 
ent likelihood  in  indicating  that  the  deliberate  symbol- 
ism does  not  extend  beyond  a  few  of  the  most  conspic- 
uous figures;  and  that  these  figures,  together  with  the 
occurrences  among  which  they  move,  have  a  courtly 
and  personal,  rather  than  political,  significance.  The 
poet's  desire,  one  would  imagine,  must  certainly  have 
been  to  deal  with  fails  accomplis  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
flatter  the  person  of  principal  importance  —  that  is, 
the  Queen  —  rather  than  to  venture  upon  the  hazard- 
ous course  of  upholding  any  particular  court  faction  in 
a  controversy  still  unsettled.  Altogether,  it  seems  clear 
that  the  story  of  the  play,  instead  of  reflecting  in  detail 
the  real  incidents  of  contemporary  history,  is  rather  a 
tissue  of  harmlessly  imaginary  pictures  shot  through 
with  idealized  references  to  such  actual  .happenings  as 
the  poet  might  feel  to  be  wholly  devoid  of  offence  to 
his  royal  auditress.  The  natural  interpretation  of  the 
comedy,  and  the  only  one  so  far  suggested  which  seems 
to  rest  on  sane  and  logical  premises,  is  that  it  delicately 
adumbrates  the  relations  between  the  Queen  and 
Leicester,  representing  Elizabeth,  of  course,  in  Cynthia, 
the  Earl  in  Endimion.  Leicester's  third  wife,  Lettice, 
Countess  of  Essex,  seems  to  be  portrayed  in  Tellus;  and 
possibly  Lyly's  patron  Burghley  in  Eumenides,  the 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY     177 

faithful  servant  and  adviser  of  Cynthia,  who  repri- 
mands the  aspiring  Endimion,  and  afterward  by  his 
generosity  makes  possible  the  latter's  reconciliation 
with  Cynthia.  In  the  years  just  before  and  after  1579, 
this  affair  had  been  very  acute;  but  in  1585-1586,  when 
"Endimion"  seems  to  have  been  written,  the  crisis 
was  apparently  well  past.  Leicester  had  ostensibly  ab- 
jured his  exorbitant  ambition  for  the  Queen's  personal 
favor,  Elizabeth's  anger  at  his  secret  marriage  had 
cooled,  and  the  earl  was  at  the  moment  engaged  in 
military  service  in  the  Low  Countries.1 

There  seems,  then,  good  cause  to  regard  "  Endimion  " 
as  a  loose,  but  infinitely  tactful  and  graceful  sketch 
of  the  relations  of  Elizabeth  and  Leicester  previous  to 
1585.  Leicester's  presumptuous  pursuit  of  the  celestial 
beauty,  and  his  juggling  between  Tellus  and  Cynthia, 
are  punished  by  that  mistrust  on  the  part  of  the  sov- 
ereign which  actually  existed  strongly  for  several  years 
after  1579,  and  to  which  the  play  repeatedly  alludes. 
The  consequences  are  represented  in  the  sleep  into 
which  Endimion  falls,  thus  losing  the  youthful  beauty 
naturally  belonging  to  him  as  Elizabeth's  avowed  lover 
and  lying  dead  (i.  e.,  disgraced  at  court),  —  till  his  over- 
weening arrogance  has  been  chastened,  when  the  mag- 
nanimity of  Eumenides  and  the  lofty  compassion  of 
Cynthia  restore  him  to  purely  political  and  impersonal 
favor.  Meantime,  Cynthia  is,  of  course,  presented  — 
as  the  Queen  would  demand  to  appear,  and  as  Shake- 
speare also  paints  her  —  as  continuing  through  the 
play  "in  maiden  meditation  fancy-free,"  entirely  una- 

1  A  more  detailed  exposition  of  the  interpretation  here  indicated 
will  be  found  in  a  paper  on  "The  Allegory  in  Lyly's  Endimion," 
Modern  Language  Notes,  Jan.,  1911. 


178  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

ware  of  the  overwhelming  adoration  which  she  has 
inspired  in  sublunary  breasts. 

Beside  this  fanciful  and  allegorical  matter,  which 
owes  only  the  vaguest  debt  to  classic  literature,  Lyly 
interweaves  in  each  of  the  three  plays  under  discussion 
purely  farcical  Plautine  scenes  of  dupery  and  servant 
wit,  such  as  he  had  already  attempted  in  "  Campaspe  " ; 
and  he  succeeds  better  than  one  would  expect  in  blend- 
ing the  unlike  strains.  In  "Sapho  and  Phao,"  the 
underplot  is  slightest  and  least  suggestive  of  Latin 
comedy.  Indeed,  the  scenes  which  portray  Trachinus 
the  courtier  and  the  scholar  Pandion,  with  their  pages, 
Criticus  and  Molus,  are  rather  unsuccessful  original 
efforts  in  the  "  Euphues  "  vein  than  importations  from 
Rome.  But  in  the  other  allegories  the  Plautine  influ- 
ence is  clear  and  increasingly  strong.  In  "Endimion" 
it  makes  up  about  a  third  of  the  play,  in  "Midas" 
nearly  a  full  half.  It  has  perhaps  not  been  sufficiently 
noted  that  Lyly  was  setting  an  example  for  Shake- 
speare in  thus  mingling  the  impalpably  imaginary  with 
the  most  opaque  realism.  The  Sir  Tophas  -  Epiton- 
Bagoa  scenes  in  "Endimion"  were  certainly  imitated 
in  the  Armado-Moth-Jaquenetta  matter  of  "Love's 
Labour  's  Lost,"  and  Shakespeare's  bringing  together 
of  Titania  and  Bottom  in  "A  Midsummer-Night's 
Dream"  is  only  that  young  poet's  direct  development 
of  Lyly's  practice. 

Lyly's  three  pastoral  plays  differ  radically  among 
themselves,  and  are  likely  to  impress  the  reader  as  cas- 
ual, tentative  productions,  defective  like  "Campaspe" 
in  conscious  dramatic  purpose,  and  lacking  the  deft- 
ness of  execution  which  the  author  developed  in  his 
handling  of  court  allegory.  The  most  attractive  of 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      179 

the  three  is  the  earliest,  "Gallathea,"  with  its  rather 
pleasing  picture  of  an  imaginary  pastoral  Lincolnshire, 
tenanted  by  pagan  deities,  nymphs,  and  sea-monsters. 
The  absurd  plot  leads  to  an  utterly  absurd  conclusion, 
but  the  atmosphere  of  the  piece  is  delicately  alluring. 
The  similarity  of  at  least  one  of  the  love  scenes  be- 
tween the  maidens  Gallathea  and  Phillida,  disguised  as 
boys  (IV,  iv),  and  those  between  Orlando  and  the 
false  Ganimede  shows  that  this  play  also  formed  part 
of  the  dramatic  equipment  of  Shakespeare.  "Love's 
Metamorphosis  "  offers  a  dramatic  version  of  the  eighth 
book  of  Ovid,  combined  with  a  slight  and  purely  fanci- 
ful story  of  nymphs  and  foresters.  "The  Woman  in  the 
Moon,"  the  only  one  of  Lyly's  accepted  plays  written 
in  verse,  has  no  underplot,  and  is  further  remarkable 
as  a  portrayal  in  very  large  part  of  the  frailties  of 
women,  —  in  noteworthy  contrast  to  the  author's  usual 
cringing  attitude  to  the  other  sex.  The  mock  mytho- 
logy upon  which  this  play  depends  is  rather  poor  stuff, 
and  the  picture  of  the  woes  of  the  four  Arcadian  shep- 
herds and  the  clownish  servant  Gunophilus  at  the  hands 
of  the  beautiful  vixen  Pandora,  though  animated,  has 
none  of  the  stately  charm  and  delicacy  of  Lyly's  more 
characteristic  method. 

It  was  only  in  his  three  allegorical  comedies  that 
Lyly  effected  a  great  advance  in  the  relation  of  English 
drama  to  classic  literature.  In  the  case  of  the  pastoral 
plays'  just  named,  he  appears  to  have  been  groping 
somewhat  darkly  in  a  region  where  other  poets  were 
already  moving  with  considerable  freedom.  Masque- 
like  productions,  such  as  Gascoigne's  show  of  Zabeta, 
prepared  among  the  "princely  pleasures"  at  Kenil- 
worth  in  1575,  Churchyard's  "Entertainment  in  Suf- 


180  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

folk  and  Norfolk"  (1578),  and  Sidney's  "Lady  of 
May"  of  the  latter  year,  show  how  blended  figures 
from  Utopian  shepherd  life  and  from  orthodox  or  in- 
vented mythology  were  being  extensively  exploited  on 
the  fashionable  amateur  stage.  Furthermore,  the  type 
of  mythological  pastoral,  to  which  Shakespeare  offered 
partial  homage  in  "A  Midsummer-Night's  Dream," 
had  attained  full  development  at  a  period  level  with 
Lyly's  earliest  dramatic  efforts  in  the  charming  work 
of  a  sweeter  and  truer  poet  than  Lyly, — in  George 
Peele's  "Arraignment  of  Paris"  (1581?).  This  delight- 
ful dramatic  idyl  illustrates  equally  with  the  plays  of 
Lyly  the  tendency  of  the  Elizabethan  stage  to  turn 
from  the  cold  realism  of  the  classic  comedy  to  the  more 
romantic  narrative  poets.  The  preponderating  Latin 
influence  upon  Lyly  is  everywhere  Ovid.  In  the  case  of 
Peele,  it  is  Vergil.  The  shepherds  of  "The  Arraign- 
ment of  Paris,"  moreover,  have  names  and  charac- 
ters borrowed  from  Spenser's  "Shepherds' Calendar" 
(1579),  and  Spenser's  debt,  like  Peele's,  goes  back  to 
the  Mantuan  poet,  partly  direct,  partly  through  the 
medium  of  Clement  Marot  and  the  other  French  Ver- 
gilians  of  the  "Pleiade." 

A  yet  more  advanced  position  is  held  by  "The  Rare 
Triumphs  of  Love  and  Fortune,"  published  in  1589, 
and  announced  as  "Plaide  before  the  Queenes  most  ex- 
cellent Maiestie."  This  work  introduces  the  gods  and 
goddesses  of  Greek  belief  merely  as  a  kind  of  chorus 
and  explanation  to  a  pretty  story  of  thwarted  princely 
lovers,  who  wander  from  court  to  forest  and  back  again, 
finally  receiving  their  happiness  by  special  arrangement 
between  Jupiter,  Fortune,  and  Venus.  As  regards  the 
human  figures,  "  The  Rare  Triumphs  "  is  almost  pure 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      181 

romantic  drama,  owing  its  effects  to  the  sometimes 
amusing,  sometimes  startling  actions  of  the  disguised 
benevolent  hermit,  and  to  the  triangle  of  passion  which 
evolves  itself  between  the  heroine,  her  lover,  and  her 
brother.  Only  in  the  figure  of  the  mischief-making 
parasite,  Penulo,  and  in  the  Olympian  framework  does 
there  remain  any  trace  of  the  classic  note  which  had 
been  so  dominant  in  earlier  attempts  to  catch  the  fancy 
of  the  Queen. 

And  so  one  finds  on  retrospect  that  the  influence  of 
classical  literature  upon  the  English  comic  stage,  which 
had  begun  to  manifest  itself  slightly  before  the  accession 
of  Elizabeth  as  a  mechanical  agent  in  the  establish- 
ment of  principles  of  structure  and  the  dissemination 
of  a  fashion  for  Plautine  realism,  was  by  1590  showing 
itself  mainly  in  works  of  pure  fancy.  The  contrast  is 
only  one  manifestation  of  the  general  deepening  of  the 
romantic  cast  of  drama,  which  made  itself  everywhere 
felt  during  the  great  decade  of  Elizabethan  comedy 
(1590-1600),  —  not  only  in  the  court  plays  we  have 
treated,  but  in  the  more  catholic  "romantic  comedies" 
of  Greene  and  Shakespeare.  Viewed  in  connection  with 
the  sudden  revulsion  to  realism  after  1600,  this  brief 
reign  of  imaginative  ideality  in  the  fin  de  swcle  comedy 
becomes  one  of  the  most  conspicuous  and  significant 
indications  of  the  spirit  of  the  epoch. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

GENERAL   COMMENTARY 

Collins,  J.  C. :  The  Predecessors  of  Shakespeare  in  Essays  and 

Studies,  1895. 
Cunliffe,  J.  W. :  The  Influence  of  Italian  on  Early  Elizabethan 


182  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Drama,  Mod.  Phil.,  iv,  597-604,  1907.    Italian  Prototypes  of 

the  Masque  and  Dumb  Show,  Publ.    Mod.  Lang.  Ass.,  xxii 

(1907),  140. 

Gayley,  C.  M.  :  An  Historical  View  of  the  Beginnings  of  Eng- 
lish Comedy,  in  Representative  English  Comedies,  1903. 
Graf,  H. :  Der  Miles  Gloriosus  im  englischen  Drama  bis  zur 

Zeit  des  Biirgerkrieges,  Schwerin,  1891. 
Koeppel,  E.  :    Studien  zur  Geschichte  der  italienischen  No- 

velle  in  der  eugliscben  Litteratur  des  IGten  Jahrhunderts, 

1892. 
Reinhardstoettner,  K.  v. :  "  Plautus  und  Terenz  und  ihr  Ein- 

fluss  auf  die  spateren  Litteratureri,"  in  Plautus,  1886. 
Schiicking,  L.  L.  :  Studien  iiber  die  stoff  lichen  Beziehungen  der 

englischen  Koinodie  zur  italienischen  bis  Lilly,  Halle  a.  S., 

1901. 
Smith,  "Winifred  :  Italian  and  Elizabethan  Comedy,  Mod.  Phil., 

v  (1908),  555-567. 

TUDOR  TRANSLATIONS  OF  PLAUTUS  AND  TERENCE 

TERENCE.  Andria  :  Terens  in  englysh.  ..."  The  translacyon  out 
of  Latin  into  englysh  of  the  f urst  comedy  of  tyrens  callyd 
Andria,"  n.  d.  (1520  ?)  (Latin  and  English.)  —  The  first  Co- 
moedie  of  Terence,  in  English.  "  A  furtherance  for  the  attain- 
ment vnto  the  right  knowledge,  &  true  proprietie,  of  the  Latin 
Tong.  .  .  .  Carefully  translated  out  of  Latin,  by  Maurice  Kyf- 
fin,"  1588. 

Flourea  for  Latine  speakyng,  selected  and  gathered  out  of  Ter- 
ence, and  the  same  translated  into  englyshe  .  .  .  Compiled  by 
Nicholas  Udall.  1st  ed.  ca.  1533.  Newly  corrected  and  im- 
printed, 1560.  Enlarged  editions,  1575,  1581. 

Terence  in  English.  Fabulce  comici  .  .  .  Terentii  omnes  Angli- 
cce  factce  (by  Richard  Bernard),  1598.  Five  other  editions  be- 
fore 1643.  Contains  translations  of  Adelphi,  Andria,  Eunuchus, 
Heautontimoroumenos,  Hecyra,  Phormio. 

PLAUTUS  :  Menaecmi.  A  pleasant  and  fine  Conceited  Comcedie, 
taken  out  of  the  most  excellent  wittie  Poet  Plautus.  .  .  .  Written 
in  English  by  W.  PF(aruer),  1595.  Reprinted,  J.  Nichols, 
Six  Old  Plays,  I,  1779 ;  Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's  Library,  v, 
1875. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      183 

I.  COMEDIES  SHOWING  THE  DIRECT  INFLUENCE  OF  PLACTUS 
AND  TERENCE 

Jack  Juggler:  "  A  new  Enterlude  for  Chyldren  to  playe  named 
lacke  lugeler  .  .  .  Newly  Imprented,"  W.  Copland,  n.  d. 
Facsimile,  E.  W.  Ashbee,  1876,  and  J.  W.  Farmer.  Re- 
printed, J.  Haslewood,  Two  Interludes,  1820;  F.  J.  Child, 
Four  Old  Plays,  1848;  A.  B.  Grosart,  Misc.  Fuller  Worthies  Li- 
brary, vol.  iv,  1873;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ii,  1874  ;  J.  S.  Farmer, 
Anonymous  Plays,  Series  iii,  1906;  W.  H.  Williams,  Materi- 
alien  (in  preparation). 

U  i  >  A  I.L,  NICHOLAS  :  Ralph  Roister  Bolster.  Licensed  to  Thomas 
Hacket,  1566/7.  Copy  lacking  title-page,  in  Eton  College  Li- 
brary. Reprinted,*?.  Briggs,  1818  ;  F.  Marshall,  1821 ;  T.  White, 
Old  English  Drama,  vol.  i,  1830 ;  W.  D.  Cooper,  Shakespeare 
Society,  1847  (with  Gorboduc);  E.  Arber,  English  Reprints, 
1869 ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iii,  1874  ;  J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  ii, 
1897;  W.  H.  Williams  and  P.  A.  Robins,  Temple  Dramatists, 
1901;  J.  S.  Farmer,  two  uncritical  reprints,  1906  and  1907; 
E.  Fliigel,  in  Gayley's  Representative  English  Comedies,  1903. 
Discussion:  E.  Fliigel,  "  Nicholas  Udall's  Dialogues  and  Inter- 
ludes," Furnivall  Miscellany,  xiii,  pp.  81  ff,  1901;  J.  W.  Hales, 
"  The  Date  of  the  First  English  Comedy,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xviii, 
408-421, 1893  ;  D.  L.  Maulsby,  "The  relation  between  Udall'a 
1  Roister  Doister  '  and  the  Comedies  of  Plautus  and  Terence," 
Engl.  Stud.,  xxxviii  (1907),  251  ff ;  M.  Walter,  "  Beitrage  zu 
Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  Engl.  Stud.,  v  (1882),  67-84  ;  W.  H. 
Williams,  "  Ralph  Roister  Doister,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xxxvi  (1906), 
179-186. 

STEVENSON,  WILLIAM  ?  :  Gammer  Ourton's  Needle.  "  A 
Ryght  Pithy,  Pleasaunt  and  inerie  Comedie  :  Intytuled  Gam- 
mer gurtons  Nedle :  Played  on  Stage,  not  longe  ago  in 
Christes  Colledge  in  Cambridge.  Made  by  Mr.  S.  Mr.  of 
Art,"  Th.  Colwell,  1575.  Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer,  1910.  Re- 
printed 1661  ;  T.  Hawkins,  Origin  of  the  English  Drama,  1773  ; 
Dodsley,  all  edd. ;  The  Ancient  British  Drama,  1810,  vol.  i ;  J. 
M.  Manly,  Specimens,  ii,  1897  ;  H.  Bradley  in  Representative 
English  Comedies,  1903.  J.  S.  Farmer,  Anonymous  Plays, 
3d  Series,  1906.  Discussion:  C.  M.  Ross,  Anglia,  rix  (1896), 
297,  "  The  Authorship  of  Gammer  Gurton's  Needle." 


184  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

The  Birth  of  Hercules.  Free  translation  from  Amphitruo.  MS., 
Brit.  Mas.  Printed,  M.  W.  Wallace,  1903. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM  :    The   Comedy   of  Errors.    First 
printed  in  the  1623  Shakespeare  Folio. 
To  the  same  class  belong  also  the  following  later  plays  :  — 

HEYWOOD,  THOMAS  :  The  Captives,  or  the  Lost  Recov- 
ered. MS.  Printed,  A.  H.  Bullen,  Old  Plays,  vol.  iv,  1885. 

JONSON,  BENJAMIN  :  The  Alchemist.  Acted  1610,  printed 
1C>12.  Included  in  the  1616  Jonson  Folio,  and  in  the  later  col- 
lected editions. 


II.  PLATS  SHOWING  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  ITALIAN  ADAPTATIONS 
OF  CLASSICAL  COMEDY 

GASCOIGNE,  GEORGE  :  Collected  Works,  including  The  Sup- 
poses: "  A  hundreth  sundrie  Flowres  bounde  up  in  one  small 
Poesie,"  printed  for  R.  Smith,  n.  d. ;  "The  Posies  of  George 
Gascoigne  Esquire,"  1575 ;  "  The  pleasauntest  workes  of 
George  Gascoigne  Esquyre  :  Newly  compyled  into  one  Vol- 
ume," 1587;  "The  Complete  Poems  of  George  Gascoigne," 
2  vols.,  1869  ;  J.  W.  Cunliffe,  The  Works  of  George  Gas- 
coigne, vol.  i,  1907.  General  Commentary:  F.  E.  Schelling, "  The 
Life  and  Writings  of  George  Gascoigne,"  1893  ;  "  Three 
Unique  Elizabethan  Dramas,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  May,  1892. 
The  Supposes.  Reprinted,  T.  Hawkins,  Origin  of  the  English 
Drama,  vol.  iii,  1773  ;  J.  W.  Cunliffe,  Belles  Lettres  Series, 
1906  (with  Jocasta)',  R.  W.  Bond,  1911. 

Misogomis.  MS.,  dated  1577,  in  Devonshire  Collection. 
Printed,  A.  Brandl,  Quellen,  1898  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Six  Anony- 
mous Plays,  2d  Series,  1906  ;  R.  W.  Bond,  1911.  Discussion : 
G.  L.  Kittredge,  "The  Misogonus  and  Laurence  Johnson," 
Journal  Oerm.  Phil.,  iii,  335-337. 

The  Bugbears.  MS.  in  Brit.  Mus.  (Lansdowne,  807).  Printed, 
C.  Grabau,  Herrig's  Archiv,  98,  99  (1897);  R.  W.  Bond,  1911. 

The  Two  Italian  Gentlemen.  Reprinted,  F.  Fliigge,  Herrig's 
Archiv,  cxxiii  (1909),  Malone  Society,  1910. 

The  Taming  of  a  Shrew.  "  A  Pleasant  Conceited  Historic, 
called  the  Taming  of  a  Shrew."  Printed  by  P.  Short  for  C. 
Burbie,  1594.  Facsimiles  by  E.  W.  Ashbee,  1876  ;  C.  Prseto- 
rius,  1886.  Reprinted  1596  ;  1607  ;  T.  Amyot,  Shakespeare 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      185 

Society,  1844 ;  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's  Library,  vol.  vi, 
1875  ;  F.  S.  Boas,  Shakespeare  Classics,  1908. 
The  Taming  of  the  Shrew.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Shake- 
speare Folio.  Published  separately,  "  A  wittie  and  pleasant 
comedie  called  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew  .  .  ."  W.  S.  for 
lohn  Smethwicke,  1631.  Discussion:  E.  H.  Schomberg,  "The 
Taming  of  the  Shrew.  Eine  Studie  zu  Shaksperes  Kunst," 
Studien  zur  engl.  Philologie,  xx,  1904  ;  A.  H.  Tolman,  "  Shake- 
speare's Part  in  the  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  Publ.  Mod.  Lang. 
Ass.,  v,  1890;  "The  Origin  of  Induction  to  Taming  of  the 
Shrew,"  Shakespeare  Society  Papers,  vol.  ii. 

III.  PLATS  SHOWING  CHARACTERISTIC  NATIONAL  ADAPTATIONS 
OF  THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  CLASSIC  COMEDY 

LYLY,  JOHN:  Collected  editions  of  his  plays:  E.  Blount,  "Sixe 
Court  Comedies.  Often  Presented  and  Acted  before  Queene 
Elizabeth,  by  the  Children  of  her  Maiesties  Chappell,  and 
the  Children  of  Panics.  Written  By  ...  lolm  Lilly,  Master 
of  Arts,"  1632  (includes  Endimion,  Campaspe,  Sapho  and 
Phao,  Gatathea,  Myda»>  Mother  Bombie);  F.  W.  Fairholt,  Dra- 
matic Works,  2  vols.,  1858;  R.  W.  Bond,  "The  Complete 
Works  of  John  Lyly,"  3  vols.,  1902.  General  Criticism: 
W.  Bang  and  H.  de  Vocht,  "  John  Lyly  und  Erasmus," 
in  Englische  Studien,  xxxvi,  1906,  386-389  ;  Bond,  R.  W., 
"John  Lyly:  Novelist  and  Dramatist,"  Quarterly  Review, 
Jan.,  1896;  Bond,  "  Lyly's  Doubtful  Poems,"  Athenaeum,  May 
9,  1903 ;  A.  Feuillerat,  "  John  Lyly.  Contribution  a  1'histoire 
de  la  renaissance  en  Angleterre,"  1910 ;  J.  Goodlet,  "  Shak- 
spere's  Debt  to  John  Lilly,"  Engl.  Stud.,  v  (1882),  356-363; 
W.  W.  Greg,  "On  the  Authorship  of  the  Songs  in  Lyly's 
Plays,"  Mod.  Lang.  Review,  i  (1905),  43-52  ;  C.  C.  Hense, 
"John  Lilly  und  Shakespeare,"  Sh.  Jb.  vii,  238  S,  viii,  224-279 
(1872-73)  ;  J.  D.  Wilson,  "  John  Lyly,"  Harness  Prize 
Essay,  1905;  K.  Steinhauser,  "John  Lyly  sis  Dramatiker," 
Halle,  1884. 

Individual  Plays  of  Lyly :  — 

Campaspe.  Three  early  editions  are  known :  — 

(a)  "  Campaspe.  Played  beefore  the  Queenes  Maiestie  on  new- 
yeares  day  at  night,  by  her  Maiesties  Children,  and  the 
Children  of  1'aules."  Th.  Cadman,  1584. 


186  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

(6)  "  A  moste  excellent  Comedie  of  Alexander,  Campaspe, 

and  Diogenes.  Played  before  the  Queenes  Maiestie  on 

twelfe  day  at  night  .  .  ."  Th.  C  adman,  1584.  (Said  to 

be  identical  with  former  in  text.) 

(c)  "Campaspe.  Played    beefore   the   Queenes  maiestie   on 

twelfe  day  at  night  .  .  ."  William  Broome,  1591. 
Reprinted,  Dodsley,  Reed's  and  Collier's  editions,  1780,  1825; 
The  Ancient  British  Drama,  vol.  i,  1810  :  J.  M.  Manly,  Speci- 
mens, ii,  1897;  G.  P.  Baker  in  Representative  English  Comedies, 
1903.  Discussion :  E.  Koeppel,  "  Zu  Lyly's  Alexander  and 
Campaspe,"  Herrig's  Archiv,  ex  (1903);  A.  B.  Prowse,  "Na- 
ture Notes  on  Campaspe,"  A cademy,  1880;  R.  Sprenger,  "  Zu 
John  Lilly's  Campaspe,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xvi  (1892),  156. 

Bapho  and  Phao.  "  Played  beefore  the  Queenes  Maiestie  on 
Shrouetewsday,  by  her  Maiesties  Children,  and  the  Boyes 
of  Paules."  Th.  Cadman,  1584.  Another  edition,  William 
Broome,  1591.  Discussion:  F.  J.  Teggart,  Poet-lore,  viii,  29-33. 

Endimion,  The  Man  in  the  Moone.  "Playd  before  the 
Queenes  Maiestie  at  Greenewich  on  Candlemas  day  at  night, 
by  the  Chyldren  of  Paules."  Printed  by  I.  Charlewood  for 
the  widow  Broome,  1591.  Reprinted,  G.  P.  Baker,  1894.  Dis- 
cussion :  N.  J.  Halpin,  "  Oberon's  Vision  in  Midsummer- 
Night's  Dream,  Illustrated  by  a  Comparison  with  Lylie's 
Endymion,"  Shakespeare  Society,  1843  ;  P.  W.  Long,  "  The 
Purport  of  Lyly's  Eudymion,"  Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  Ass.,  xxiv 
(1909);  C.  F.  T.  Brooke,  "The  Allegory  in  Lyly's  Endimion," 
Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  Jan.,  1910 ;  D.  J.  Mackenzie,  Byways 
Among  Books,  u  An  Elizabethan  Endymion,"  1900. 

Gallathea.  "  As  it  was  playde  before  the  Queenes  Maiestie  at 
Greene-wiche,  on  Newyeeres  day  at  Night.  By  the  Chyldren 
of  Paules."  lohn  Charlewoode  for  the  Widdow  Broome,  1592. 

Midas.  "  Plaied  before  the  Queenes  Maiestie  upon  Twelfe  day 
at  night.  By  the  Children  of  Paules,"  1592. 

Mother  Bombie.  "  As  it  was  sundrie  times  plaied  by  the  Cbilt 
dren  of  Powles."  Cuthbert  Burby,  1594.  Another  edition,  1598. 

The  Woman  in  the  Moon.  "  As  it  was  presented  before  her 
Highnesse.  By  lohn  Lyllie  maister  of  Artes,"  1597. 

Love's  Metamorphosis.  "  A  Wittie  and  Courtly  Pastorall. 
Written  by  Mr.  lohn  Lyllie.  First  playd  by  the  Children  of 
Paules,  and  now  by  the  Children  of  the  Chappell,"  1601. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  COMEDY      187 

PEELE,  GEORGE  :  The  Arraignment  of  Paris.  "  A  Pastorall. 

Presented    before   the   Queenes   Maiestie,   by   the    Children 

of  her  Chappell."     H.    Marsh,  1584.     Reprinted  separately, 

O.  Smeaton,  Temple  Dramatists,  1905  ;  Malone  Soc.,  1910. 
The  Rare  Triumphs  of  Love  and  Fortune.  "Plaide  before 

the  Queenes  most  excellent  Maiestie:  wherein  are  many  fine 

Conceites  with  great  delight,"  1589.    Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier, 

"  Five  Old  Plays,"  Roxburghe  Club,  1851;  Ha^.litt,  Dodsley,  vi, 

1874. 
The  Maid's  Metamorphosis.  "  As  it  hath  bone  sundry  times 

Acted  by  the  Children  of  Powles,"  1600.  Reprinted,  A.  H. 

Bullen,  Old  Plays,  vol.  i,  Tudor  Reprints  and  Parallel  Textt, 

1908;  R.  W.  Bond,  Lyly's  Works,  iii. 
GASCOIGNE,  GEORGE  :  Masque  of  Zabeta.  "  Princely  Pleasures 

at  the  Court  at  Kenelworth,"  1575.  Hazlitt's  ed.,  ii,  108-123. 
SIDNEY,  SIR  PHILIP  :  The  Lady  of  May.   "  Entertainment  of 

her  Majesty  at  Wanstead,"  1578.  Gray's  ed.,  1860,  265  ff. 
CHURCHYARD,  T. :  The  Queen's  Entertainment  in  Suffolk 

and   Norfolk.   Reprinted,  J.  Nichols,  "  Progresses  ...  of 

Queen  Elizabeth." 
CHAPMAN,  GEORGE  :  All  Fools,  1605.  Discussion :  E.  Koeppel, 

"  Quellen  Studien  zu  den  Dramen  George   Chapman's,  Ph. 

Massinger's,  und  John  Ford's,"  1897.   E.  Woodbridge,  "  An 

unnoted  Source  of  Chapman's  All  Fools,"  Jrl.  Germ.  PhiL,  i, 

338-341.  See  bibliography  to  ch.  xi. 


CHAPTER  VI 

CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE   IN   TRAGEDY 

IN  certain  points  of  outward  form  — notably  in  the 
matter  of  act  and  scene  division,  and  in  the  nowhere 
dominant  tendency  toward  unity  of  time  and  place  — 
Roman  comedy  and  tragedy  exerted  upon  the  English 
drama  a  practically  identical  influence.  Imitations  of 
Seneca's  tragedies  followed  very  close  upon  the  intro- 
duction of  Plautine  comedy,  and  in  the  case  of  such 
tragi-comical  medleys  as  "Damon  and  Pithias"  it  is 
hardly  practicable  to  determine  the  exact  provenance 
of  the  classical  elements.  One  of  the  results  of  Latin 
study  was,  however,  a  growing  appreciation  of  the  dif- 
ference between  comedy  and  tragedy,  and  a  considera- 
tion of  the  Elizabethan  plays  moulded  on  Roman  pre- 
cedent shows  that  Senecan  tragedy  exercised  over  the 
drama  a  force  not  altogether  analogous  to  that  of  the 
Latin  comic  writers.  This  diversity  of  effect  is  ac- 
counted for  not  by  any  great  disparity  in  power  be- 
tween the  comedy  and  the  tragedy  of  Rome,  but  by  the 
very  striking  difference  in  the  degree  in  which  the 
native  English  stage  was  adapted  to  the  development 
of  comic  and  tragic  themes. 

The  interlude  had  evolved  entirely  in  the  direction 
of  comedy,  and  hence  had  kept  alive  popular  interest 
in  this  form  of  drama  alone.  The  earliest  imitations  of 
Plautus  and  Terence  found  a  general  public  not  only 
prepared  to  appreciate  them,  but  positively  eager  for 
improvement  and  novelty  in  this  line.  From  the  very 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY    189 

first,  therefore,  classical  English  comedy  had  a  popular 
tone.  Such  early  academic  efforts  even  as  "Roister 
Doister"  and  "Gammer  Gurton's  Needle"  —  the  one 
destined  almost  certainly  for  presentation  as  a  school 
exercise,  the  other  for  performance  at  a  Cambridge 
college  —  have  a  perfectly  general  appeal,  and  show  a 
large  if  not  predominating  infusion  of  native  humorous 
material.  The  domestication  and  nationalizing  of  Latin 
comic  influence  was  thus  immediate  because  of  the 
vigor  and  assimilative  force  of  native  English  comedy. 

The  first  imitators  of  Latin  tragedy,  on  the  other 
hand,  appealed  to  no  established  taste  and  satisfied  no 
conscious  popular  want.  Thirty  years  of  Elizabeth's 
reign,  indeed,  passed  before  any  widespread  public  in- 
terest in  genuine  tragedy  manifested  itself.  Appealing 
only  to  limited  circles  of  scholarly  amateurs  and  af- 
fected by  no  home-born  conventions  or  precedents,  the 
English  followers  of  Seneca  remained  considerably 
nearer  to  their  original  than  the  adapters  of  Latin 
comedy;  and  they  started  a  fashion  of  academic  trag- 
edy which  maintained  itself  in  successive  phases 
through  the  entire  reign  of  Elizabeth,  wholly  independ-  * 
ent  of  the  popular  stage  and  usually  in  opposition  to  it.  r 

The  ultimate  model  of  classic  tragedy  was  furnished 
for  the  Elizabethans  by  the  ten  plays  ascribed  to  the 
philosopher  Seneca.  Of  these  dramas,  widely  studied 
in  renaissance  Europe,  at  least  six  had  appeared  in 
English  translation  between  the  years  1559  and  1566  ;l 
and  in  1581  the  different  versions  were  collected  into 
a  single  volume  by  Thomas  Newton,  with  the  addition 
of  the  omitted  "Thebais,"  "  Hippolytus,"  and  "Her- 

1  A  translation  of  a  seventh  play,  Octaria,  was  printed  about 
the  same  time,  without  date. 


190  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

cules  CEtseus." l  As  in  the  case  of  comedy,  Latin  trag- 
edy exercised  an  indirect  control  over  English  drama 
through  the  means  of  Italian  imitation;  and  during  the 
last  two  decades  of  the  Tudor  period  a  third  wave  of 
influence  reached  the  country  hi  the  efforts  of  the  Coun- 
tess of  Pembroke's  coterie  to  domesticate  the  work  of 
the  French  Senecan  school.  Contact  with  Greek  trag- 
edy is  evident  only  in  Lady  Lumley's  dilettante  ren- 
dering of  "Iphigenia  at  Aulis,"  preserved  in  a  single 
private  manuscript;  and  very  indirectly  in  the  "Jo- 
casta,"  translated  by  Gascoigne  and  Kinwelmersh 
from  Dolce's  Italian  play,  which  is  itself  a  variation  at 
second  hand  of  Euripides. 

Elizabethan  tragedy  borrowed  from  Seneca  and  long 
retained  the  ghost,  the  chorus,  and  the  predilection  for 
gruesome  plots  involving  hereditary  sin  or  unnatural 
crime.  The  great  and  lasting  contribution  was,  of  course, 
blank  verse,  —  a  happy  accident  first  hit  upon  by 
Surrey  as  a  substitute  for  Vergilian  hexameter,  and 
confirmed  by  the  authors  of  "  Gorboduc  "  as  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  Senecan  senarius.  For  this  all  impor- 
tant innovation  Latin  tragedy  can  claim  only  indirect 
credit.  Yet  without  the  example  it  afforded  it  might 
have  been  long  before  English  playwrights  discarded 
the  undramatic  stanzaic  verse  and  the  slovenly  alexan- 
drines or  "fourteeners"  of  the  day.  Other  features  of 
Seneca's  style  —  his  tendency  to  extended  self -analy- 
sis and  reflection,  his  love  of  sententious  epigram  and 
the  cut  and  thrust  of  sticho-mythic  dialogue  —  were 

1  The  translation  of  the  Thebais,  which  is  fragmentary,  was  made 
by  Newton,  the  editor  of  the  collection.  The  versions  of  the  other 
two  plays,  by  John  Studley,  were  probably  contemporary  with 
Studley's  renderings  of  Agamemnon  and  Medea,  printed  in  1566. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     191 

carefully  transplanted  into  English  tragedy,  where 
they  did  much  to  create  a  sense  of  form  and  to  raise  the 
drama  to  the  dignity  of  a  conscious  literary  product,  a 
dignity  to  which  it  originally  made  no  claim  and  which 
it  was  long  in  winning. 

Pure  Senecan  tragedy  was  always  in  the  nature  of 
an  academic  exercise,  occupying  a  middle  ground  be- 
tween the  popular  theatre  and  the  collegiate  patronage 
of  untranslated  Latin  drama.  The  first  extant  example 
of  the  type,  and  therefore  the  earliest  strict  tragedy 
in  the  English  vernacular,  is  "Ferrex  and  Porrex,"  or 
"The  Tragedie  of  Gorboduc,"  as  the  first,  unauthor- 
ized, edition  of  the  play  less  aptly  terms  it.  Concerning 
the  external  history  of  this  work  a  considerable  amount 
of  information  is  preserved  by  the  various  title-pages 
and  prefaces.  It  was  written  —  the  first  three  acts  by 
Thomas  Norton,  the  rest  by  Thomas  Sackville,  later 
Earl  of  Dorset  —  for  performance  before  Queen  Eliza- 
beth at  Whitehall  on  January  18,  1561-1562.  In  1565,  an 
imperfect  and  pirated  edition  was  brought  out  surrep- 
titiously, and  some  five  years  later  the  authors  saw  fit 
to  publish  the  true  version. 

As  an  equivalent  of  the  horrors  of  Greek  mythology, 
the  writers  of  "Ferrex  and  Porrex"  and  several  other 
Senecan  tragedies  chose  gruesome  passages  from  the 
mythical  history  of  Britain.  These  stories  of  the  leg- 
endary descendants  of  Brute,  derived  from  Geoffrey  of 
Monmouth's  "Historia  Britonum,"  became  one  of  the 
most  fruitful  sources  of  Elizabethan  dramatic  plot,  fur- 
nishing forth  at  least  ten  extant  plays,  of  which  two 
are  the  acknowledged  and  two  others  the  reputed  per- 
formances of  Shakespeare.1  The  later  workers  in  this 
1  Viz.,  King  Lear,  Cymbeline,  Locrine,  The  Birth  of  Merlin, 


192  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

field  were  attracted  to  it  mainly  by  the  idyllic  charm 
of  the  Arthurian  atmosphere  and  the  romantic  excite- 
ment of  the  incidents;  but  the  inaugurators  of  the  Sene- 
can  method  turned  thither  undoubtedly  in  search  of 
the  ghastly  horror  which  the  Roman  dramatist  had 
found  and  exploited  in  Greek  legend,  and  they  did  not 
scruple  to  distort  Geoffrey's  narrative  in  order  to  bring 
into  bold  relief  the  favorite  Latin  themes  of  ancestral 
impiety  and  avenging  fate. 

The  authors  of  "Ferrex  and  Porrex"  wrote  with  a 
purpose.  It  was  their  design  to  present  before  the 
young  queen,  who  had  sat  only  four  years  upon  her 
throne,  a  lurid  picture  of  the  terrors  attendant  upon  an 
unsettled  succession.  The  disastrous  folly  of  the  old 
king  Gorboduc,  who  Lear-like  transmits  and  divides 
his  trust  of  sovereignty  before  death  has  relieved  him  of 
it;  the  discord,  and  the  unnatural  fate  that  befalls  each 
of  the  jointly  ruling  sons,  Ferrex  and  Porrex,  and  the 
black  consequences  of  the  original  fault  in  extirpation 
of  the  sinning  family  and  ruin  of  the  kingdom  consti- 
tute a  theme  suggestive  at  once  of  the  Greek  story  of 
the  war  of  the  sons  of  (Edipus  and  the  destruction 
of  Thebes.  Except  only  in  disregarding  the  unities  of 
time  and  place,  the  treatment  follows  step  by  step  the 
^  practice  of  Seneca  and  the  rules  of  Horace  till  the  close 
of  the  fourth  act,  where,  the  tragedy  having  properly 
concluded  in  the  death  of  all  the  main  figures,  the 
author  (Sackville)  permits  himself  a  dramatically  su- 
pererogatory excursus  upon  the  sufferings  of  an  ungov- 
erned  state.  It  is  doubtless  true,  as  Professor  Manly 
remarks,  that  the  play  really  exists  for  the  sake  of  this 
excrescent  fifth  act  and  the  numerous  homiletic  pas- 
sages in  the  earlier  part,  all  designed  to  make  clear  to 


TITLE-PAGE  OK  WILLIAM  ALABASTER'S 
LATIN  TRAGEDY  OF  "  ROXANA,"  1G32 

Giving  a  picture  of  an  academic  stage,  with 
actors  and  audience 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     193 

the  royal  auditress  her  duty  of  preserving  the  throne 
by  immediate  marriage  from  the  danger  of  conflicting 
claimants. 

The  blank  verse  of  "Ferrex  and  Porrex,"  that  as- 
cribed to  Norton  hardly  less  than  the  more  famous 
verse  of  Sackville,  is  remarkably  regular  and  eupho- 
nious. From  this  accurate,  if  somewhat  too  sedate,  v 
metre  to  that  of  Marlowe  is  certainly  a  long  step,  but 
it  is  only  one;  and  it  can  hardly  be  said  that  the  quar- 
ter century  which  intervened  between  this  play  and 
"Tamburlaine"  produced  any  very  material  advance 
in  point  of  versification.  The  peculiar  characteristics 
of  the  drama  and  the  way  in  which  it  measured  up  to 
sixteenth-century  critical  standards  are  both  indicated 
very  fairly  in  Sidney's  famous  appreciation:1  "It  is  full 
of  stately  speeches  and  well  sounding  Phrases,  clyming 
to  the  height  of  Seneca  his  stile,  and  as  full  of  notable 
moralitie,  which  it  doth  most  delightfully  teach,  and 
so  obtayne  the  very  end  of  Poesie." 

"Ferrex  and  Porrex"  domesticated  in  English  Sene- 
can  tragedy  a  characteristic  which,  though  possessing 
no  counterpart  in  the  classical  drama,  became  as  not- 
able a  feature  of  the  type  as  the  ghost  or  the  chorus. 
This  was  the  dumb-show,  which  preceded  each  act 
even  as  the  chorus  followed  it,  —  the  one  symbolizing 
pictorially  the  events  to  ensue,  the  other  pointing  the 
moral  and  reporting  briefly  such  circumstances  as 
could  not  conveniently  be  staged.  The  dumb-show  is 
the  only  significant  element  which  early  Senecan  drama 
derived  from  native  convention :  it  seems  to  have  been 
in  the  main  a  heritage  taken  over  by  this  new  aristo- 
cratic species  from  the  older  court  and  collegiate  per- 
1  Apdogiefor  Poetrie,  ed.  Shuckburgh,  51,  52. 


194  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

formances,  and  it  is  properly  an  evidence  of  the  select 
and  undemocratic  nature  of  the  plays  in  which  it 
appears.1 

Throughout  the  Tudor  period  fashionable  celebra- 
tions at  Christmas  and  upon  other  gala  occasions  had 
been  accompanied  by  elaborate  mummings  and  ta- 
bleaux, under  the  direction  of  a  Lord  of  Misrule.  The 
records  of  the  Revels  Office  bear  witness  to  the  costly 
nature  of  such  entertainments,  even  during  the  reign 
of  the  earlier  monarchs,  and  the  surpassing  extrava- 
gance of  the  Jacobean  masques  is  well  known.  The  in- 
troduction of  the  ornamental  dumb-show  before  the 
various  acts  of  the  courtly  Senecan  tragedy  was  prob- 
ably in  some  measure  the  result  of  an  attempt  to  com- 
bine with  genuine  dramatic  interest  the  scenic  display 
possessed  by  these  rival  attractions  of  fashionable 
merry-making. 

The  Senecan  ideal  of  tragedy  held  the  scholarly 
stage  virtually  unchanged  for  nearly  a  generation. 
In  the  crucial  year  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  1587,  eight 
gentlemen  of  Gray's  Inn,  of  whom  Thomas  Hughes 
was  the  chief  and  Francis  Bacon  the  most  famous,  pre- 
sented before  the  Queen  at  Greenwich  a  play  generally 
referred  to  as  "The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur."  This  work 
represents  no  change  of  structure  or  theory  from  the 
drama  of  Norton  and  Sackville,  which  the  Queen  had 
witnessed  six  -  and  -  twenty  years  before.  In  the  later 
play,  as  in  the  earlier,  we  have  the  disregard  of  unities 
coupled  with  the  careful  observance  of  classic  rule 

1  For  a  discussion  of  the  subsidiary  Italian  influence  upon  the 
development  of  the  dumb-show,  see  J.  W.  Cunliffe,  "  Italian  Pro- 
totypes of  the  Masque  and  Dumb  Show,"  Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  Assoc^ 
xxii  (1907). 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     195 

in  all  other  respects.  Indeed,  Hughes  far  exceeds  his 
predecessors  in  servile  imitation.  The  poetry  of  Sack- 
ville  and  Norton  is  original,  though  their  method  and 
to  some  extent  their  ideas  are  borrowed;  but  Professor 
Cunliffe  prints  twenty-five  solid  pages  of  parallel  pas- 
sages, wherein  Hughes  has  cribbed  the  very  words  of  , 
Seneca.1  The  Senecan  chorus,  messengers,  and  tricks 
af  style  remain,  and  "The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur" 
agrees  with  "Gorboduc"  in  far  outgoing  Seneca  in  the 
observance  of  Horace's  caution  against  the  stage  pre- 
sentation of  gruesome  incident  ("De  Arte  Poetica," 
185-187).  No  sort  of  action  occurs  in  view  of  the  spec- 
tators, though  the  reports  of  chorus  and  nuntius  reek 
with  blood  and  horror.  The  dumb-shows  in  this  play 
are  of  unparalleled  complexity,  and  their  designing  ap- 
pears to  have  absorbed  the  entire  energies  of  three  of 
the  joint  authors.  The  most  remarkable  thing  about 
the  altogether  puerile  and  insipid  piece  is  the  distortion 
to  which  the  great  Arthurian  story  has  been  subjected 
in  the  effort  to  make  it  conform  exactly  to  the  Senecan 
model.  The  ghost  of  Gorlois  prologizes  like  Seneca's 
ghost  of  Tantalus  ("Thyestes"),  and  the  whole  ro- 
mance of  the  house  of  Uther,  as  well  as  all  the  heroism 
of  Arthur's  character,  is  flattened  and  dissipated  by 
being  dragged  into  agreement  with  the  history  of  the 
house  of  Atreus,  and  treated  as  a  vulgar  narrative  of  * 
transmitted  sin. 

In  addition  to  their  constant  discipleship  to  Seneca, 
the  devotees  of  scholarly  tragedy  studied  with  some 
effect  the  practice  of  the  Italian  renaissance  theatre. 
The  ruling  influence  in  Italian  tragedy,  as  in  English, 

1  See  J.  W.  Cunliffe,  The  Influence  of  Seneca  on  Elizabethan 
Tragedy. 


196  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

was  Seneca,  but  a  connection  with  Euripides  existed 
in  a  work  already  mentioned,  —  Lodovico  Dolce's  free 
translation,  through  the  medium  of  a  Latin  version, 
of  the  "Phrenissse"  (1559).  Dolce's  play  was  entitled 
"Giocasta,"  and  as  "Jocasta"  was  translated  into 
English  by  George  Gascoigne  and  Francis  Kinwel- 
mersh  for  presentation  at  Gray's  Inn  in  1566.  The 
drama  claims  to  be  a  rendering  of  the  original  Greek, 
"translated  and  digested  into  Acte";  but  it  follows 
Dolce  throughout  with  the  hap-hazard  fidelity  usual  to 
sixteenth-century  translations,  only  inserting  before 
each  act  the  dumb-shows  which  the  English  fashion  of 
the  time  demanded,  and  appending  an  "Epilogus"  by 
the  same  Christopher  Yelverton  who  twenty  years 
later  took  a  hand  in  arranging  the  dumb-shows  of  "The 
Misfortunes  of  Arthur." 

The  honors  of  courtly  tragic  innovation  are  equally 
divided  between  the  two  legal  societies  of  Gray's  Inn 
and  the  Inner  Temple.  To  the  credit  of  the  former  be- 
long among  extant  plays  the  Italianate  work  we  have 
just  been  discussing  and  "The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur," 
while  for  the  Inner  Temple  the  scale  is  precisely  bal- 
anced by  "Ferrex  and  Porrex"  and  the  slightly  later 
"Gismond  of  Salerne  in  Love,"  acted  before  the  Queen 
in  1568.  This  last  play  dramatizes  a  well-known  Italian 
story  in  accordance  with  the  rules  of  Senecan  tragedy. 
Like  all  the  other  existing  specimens  of  the  type,  it  is 
the  result  of  collaboration,  five  writers  being  in  some 
way  concerned  in  the  performance.  The  most  striking 
feature  of  "Gismond  of  Salerne"  is  the  tendency  to 
disregard  the  rule  against  the  ocular  presentation  of 
horror  and  bloodshed,  —  a  rule  which  Seneca  had  him- 
self several  times  broken,  but  which  the  cultivators  of 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     197 

English  classic  tragedy  ordinarily  observed  very  punc- 
tiliously. The  heroine  here  dies  in  the  sight  of  the  audi- 
ence, and  the  hero's  heart  is  brought  bleeding  upon  the 
stage.  When  Robert  Wilmot,  one  of  the  original  au- 
thors, came  to  revise  the  play  for  publication  in  1591, 
it  was  entirely  natural  that  he  should  considerably 
intensify  these  features,  which  the  success  of  Kyd's 
tragedy  and  Marlowe's  had  then  made  the  passion  of 
the  hour. 

By  one  of  the  striking  ironies  of  literary  history,  the 
same  year  (1587)  which  presented  before  Queen  Eliza- 
beth in  "The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur"  the  most  inept 
probably  of  all  the  Senecan  imitations,  brought  before 
the  general  London  populace  two  plays  that  wrecked 
forever  the  prospects  of  English  classical  tragedy: 
Marlowe's  "Tamburlaine"  and  Kyd's  "Spanish  Trag- 
edy." The  latter  play  is,  however,  itself  in  large  mea- 
sure the  result  of  the  working  of  Latin  example,  and 
its  origin  and  influence  will  require  discussion  in  this 
chapter. 

But  the  academic  Senecan  tragedy,  though  perma- 
nently severed  by  the  developments  of  Kyd  and  Mar- 
lowe from  the  possibility  of  general  influence  on  heal  thy 
dramatic  evolution,  persisted  under  altered  conditions 
for  twenty  years  longer  in  a  curious  group  of  eleven 
plays,  all  written  probably  in  consequence  of  the  im- 
pulse of  a  society  whose  president  was  the  eccentric 
Lady  Mary  Sidney,1  Countess  of  Pembroke.  Exclu- 
siveness  was  before  all  things  the  character  of  this 

1  It  is  a  convention  of  long  standing  to  refer  to  the  lady  by  this 
name,  which  emphasizes  her  connection  with  her  brother.  Sir  Philip. 
Technically,  of  course,  her  surname  after  1577  was  Herbert,  by 
reason  of  her  marriage  to  the  Earl  of  Pembroke. 


198  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

circle,  and  its  productions,  though  conducing  in  no 
respect  to  catholic  or  permanent  results,  form  one  of 
the  most  interesting  backwaters  which  issue  from  the 
main  dramatic  current  and  finally  disappear  in  the 
sandy  waste  of  affectation.  For  a  time  there  was  about 
these  literary  exquisites  a  certain  vigor  and  consider- 
able poetic  freshness. 

The  earlier  patrons  of  classical  tragedy  had  modelled 
their  works  either  directly  upon  the  plays  of  Seneca 
or  upon  Italian  imitations.  The  Countess  of  Pembroke 
and  her  followers  took  as  their  pattern  the  French 
Senecan  dramatist,  Robert  Gamier  (1534-1590),  whose 
eight  plays  ("Porcie,"  1568 ;  "Hippolyte,"  1573  ;  "Cor- 
nelie,"  1574;  "Marc-Antoine,"  1578;  "La  Troade," 
1578;  "Antigone,"  1579;  "Les  Juives,"  1580;  and 
"Bradamante,"  1580)  had  already  been  repeatedly 
published  both  singly  and  in  collected  editions.  The 
English  school  began  unostentatiously  with  simple 
translation  of  the  admired  works,  Lady  Pembroke  in- 
augurating the  movement  with  her  version  of  "An- 
tonie,"  executed  in  1590  and  published  two  years 
later.  In  1594  Thomas  Kyd  produced  a  rendering  of 
the  "Corn61ie,"  which  he  inscribed  to  the  Countess  of 
Sussex  with  the  promise,  presumably  never  fulfilled, 
of  an  immediate  translation  of  another  of  Garnier's 
Roman  tragedies,  the  "Portie." 

The  differences  between  the  tragedies  of  Seneca  and 
the  Franco -Latin  plays  which  at  this  period  were 
attracting  the  fastidious  notice  of  the  English  blue- 
stockings are  rather  striking.  Gamier,  like  most  of  the 
French  classicists,  made  a  point  of  outdoing  his  masters 
in  all  that  pertained  to  correctness.  The  melodramatic 
sensationalism  of  the  Latin  poet  —  the  feature  which 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     199 

made  him  in  a  sense  the  father  of  English  tragedy  —  is 
carefully  pruned  from  the  plays  of  Gamier.  The  ghost 
is  banished  as  ill-bred;  stage  action,  so  far  as  it  existed, 
carefully  replaced  by  seemly  moralizing  and  tedious 
narrative.  The  part  of  the  chorus  is  increased  and  the 
lyric  effect  in  every  way  intensified.  Dramatic  conflict 
and  spectacular  interest  are  refined  away,  and  the 
plays  affect  the  reader  solely  as  collections  of  graceful 
elegiacs.  A  few  lines  from  Cleopatra's  speech  at  the 
opening  of  the  fifth  act  of  the  "Antonie,"  which  gives 
everywhere  a  very  close  rendering  of  Garnier's  French, 
will  indicate  the  characteristic  features  of  sentiment 
and  expression:  — 

"Cleop.  O  cruell  Fortune,  o  accursed  lott! 
O  plaguy  loue!  o  most  detested  brand! 
O  wretched  ioyes!  o  beauties  miserable! 
O  deadlie  state!  o  deadly  roialtie! 
O  hatefull  life!  o  Queene  most  lamentable! 
O  Antonie  by  my  fault  buriable! 
O  hellish  worke  of  heau'n!  alas!  the  wrath 
Of  all  the  Gods  at  once  on  vs  is  falne  ! " 

The  "Cornelie,"  which  Kyd  took  upon  himself  to 
translate,  is  probably  of  all  Garnier's  plays  the  most 
deficient  in  dramatic  incident.  The  entire  interest  is 
retrospective.  Throughout  the  five  acts  Cornelia  la- 
ments the  death  of  her  husband  and  her  father,  or 
bandies  rhetoric  with  her  consolers.  Caesar  and  Mark 
Antony,  Cassius  and  Brutus,  are  introduced  in  couples 
to  give  the  work  historical  body,  but  there  is  no  shred 
of  plot.  The  number  of  characters  on  the  stage  in  addi- 
tion to  the  chorus  never  exceeds  two  and  is  more  fre- 
quently limited  to  one.  The  entire  value  of  the  piece 
is  measured  by  the  neat  finish  of  the  dialogue  and  the 


200  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

rhythmic  beauty  of  the  choral  songs.  There  are  few 
circumstances  more  striking  when  considered  as  curi- 
osities of  literature,  or  when  seriously  examined,  more 
illustrative  of  the  wavering  dramatic  ideals  of  the 
period,  than  the  fact  that  the  author  who  in  1587 
had  achieved  the  tremendous  popular  success  of  "  The 
Spanish  Tragedy"  should  seven  years  later  have  pro- 
duced the  version  of  the  "Cornelia."  The  two  works 
are  antipodal,  and  the  existence  of  the  earlier  rendered 
the  production  of  the  other  a  mockery  and  labor  lost. 
But  the  writer  was  far  from  realizing  this,  and  the  con- 
temporary status  of  the  drama  was  such  that  he  could 
slight,  to  all  appearances,  the  great  popular  work  and 
find  cause  of  pride  and  profit  in  his  humble  adherence 
to  an  aristocratic  whimsy.  Instances  like  this  sound  a 
warning  against  depreciation  of  the  academic  drama. 
It  is  very  likely  that  the  subterranean  influence  of  this 
superficially  trivial  and  detached  species  was  much 
more  potent  than  now  appears. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  Kyd's  "Cornelia"  ap- 
peared, Samuel  Daniel,  the  greatest  of  the  regular  sup- 
porters of  the  school  of  Gamier,  produced  in  the 
"Tragedy  of  Cleopatra"  the  finest  play  of  this  type. 
"Cleopatra"  is  not  a  rendering  from  the  French,  but 
a  continuation  in  Garnier's  style  of  the  "Antonie," 
which  Daniel's  patroness  had  recently  translated.  In 
1598  an  additional  link  in  the  chain  of  Antony  and 
Cleopatra  dramas  was  forged  by  Samuel  Brandon, 
an  obscure  member  of  the  same  coterie;  and  in  1605 
Daniel  published  a  second  classical  tragedy,  drawn  from 
Plutarch's  Life  of  Alexander  and  entitled  "Philotas." 
An  interesting  evidence  of  the  parallel  development 
of  academic  tragedy  in  court  and  college  circles  is 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     201 

afforded  by  Daniel's  kindly  allusion  to  a  play  on  the 
same  subject  as  his  own  by  his  "deare  friend  D.  Late- 
ware,"  which  had  been  "presented  in  St.  Johns  Col- 
ledge  in  Oxford,  where  as  I  after  heard,  it  was  worthily 
and  with  great  applause  performed." 

Another  member  of  the  Sidney  circle,  Fulke  Gre- 
ville,  Lord  Brooke,  created  a  slight  diversion  in  "Ala- 
ham  "  and  "  Mustapha,"  plays  rigidly  classical  in  form, 
but  original  in  content,  the  subject  being  in  the  one 
case  the  author's  invention  and  in  the  other  an  adap- 
tation of  oriental  history. 

With  this  group  of  classical  tragedies,  all  the  fruit  of 
the  scholarly  enthusiasm  of  a  well-known  social  set,  and 
all  very  probably  composed  during  the  last  thirteen 
years  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  should  be  considered  four 
other  plays  written  a  couple  of  years  later  by  the  Scot- 
tish knight  Sir  William  Alexander,  afterward  Earl 
of  Stirling.  Alexander's  "Darius"  (1603),  "Croesus" 
(1604),  "The  Alexandrian "  (1605),  and  "Julius 
Caesar"  (1607)  were  in  the  last  year  collected  under  the 
title  of  "Monarchicke  Tragedies."  Classical  after  the 
special  manner  of  the  French  Senecans  in  the  employ- 
ment of  metre,  chorus,  and  messenger,  and  frankly  in- 
capable of  public  representation,  these  plays  are  prob- 
ably an  echo  from  the  northern  half  of  Britain  of  the 
strain  of  aristocratic  closet  tragedy  which  Lady  Pem- 
broke had  introduced  and  Daniel  established  at  the 
southern  court. 

In  the  style  of  subjects  treated  a  notable  difference 
exists  between  the  productions  of  the  Franco-Latin 
school  and  the  earlier  imitative  works  of  Sackville, 
Gascoigne,  and  Hughes.  The  taste  for  melodramatic 
horror  is  replaced  by  that  interest  in  the  romance  of 


202  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

history  which  is  in  general  one  of  the  most  striking 
literary  characteristics  of  the  agel  On  this  one  side  the 
affected  work  of  the  disciples  of  Gamier  voices  the 
same  taste  which  attracted  to  classic  themes  the  two 
greatest  dramatists  of  the  time,  Shakespeare  and  Jon- 
son.  Of  the  eleven  plays  just  mentioned,  all  except 
Greville's  two  original  tragedies  are  based  on  ancient 
history  and  have  for  their  acknowledged  purpose  the 
portrayal  of  actual  figures  and  situations.  Five  deal 
with  the  great  epoch  of  the  Roman  civil  wars  and 
present  the  mighty  protagonists  in  that  struggle:  Julius 
Csesar,  Antony,  and  Cleopatra.  Three  others  concern 
the  life  of  Alexander  the  Great.  The  cult  of  grisly  an- 
cient myth,  exploited  by  Seneca  and  his  earlier  English 
followers,  is  supplanted  by  the  cult  of  Plutarch,  every- 
where the  strongest  classical  force  in  later  Elizabethan 
drama.  Thus,  while  adhering  with  all  tenacity  to  the 
strictest  Latin  rules  of  structure,  the  academic  tragedy 
had  come  to  range  itself  in  the  choice  of  subject  matter 
side  by  side  with  the  popular  drama.  The  inevitable 
contrast  was  forever  fatal  to  the  weaker  type.  Daniel's 
"Cleopatra,"  a  poetic  but  essentially  unactable  pre- 
cursor of  Shakespeare  in  the  dramatization  of  Plu- 
tarch's "Antonius,"  suffered  an  eclipse  which,  though 
natural,  was  blacker  and  more  permanent  than  the 
lyric  merits  of  this  very  graceful  piece  deserved.  Alex- 
ander's "Tragedy  of  Julius  Csesar,"  with  its  prologue 
spoken  by  Juno,  its  chorus  after  each  act,  and  its  sub- 
stitution of  the  garrulous  nuntius  in  lieu  of  stage  action, 
fell  still-born  upon  a  world  which  for  some  seven  years 
had  been  applauding  a  very  different  "  Csesar." 

The  close  of  Elizabeth's  reign  coincides  roughly  with 
the  extinction  of  the  academic  type  of  classic  English 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     203 

tragedy.  By  this  time  the  genuinely  useful  features  of 
the  Senecan  method  had  long  been  accepted  by  writers 
for  the  popular  stage  and  assimilated  into  an  organism 
possessed  of  capabilities  far  beyond  the  range  of  the 
strict  Senecans.  From  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury, classic  influence  in  tragedy  ceases  to  mean  Seneca 
or  the  Horatian  rules,  and  comes  to  mean  Plutarch,  — 
especially  Plutarch's  Lives  in  North's  translation.  The 
important  "Latin"  plays  of  James's  reign,  if  one  may 
call  them  so  even  loosely,  are  the  two  of  Ben  Jonson 
and  the  three  of  Shakespeare.  Jonson  has  a  scholar's 
respect  for  the  old  laws  of  dramatic  form,  but  in  prac- 
tice he  treats  them  with  the  independence  of  the  crea- 
tive artist.  In  "Catiline's  Conspiracy,"  he  infuses  a 
flavor  of  Seneca  by  admitting  Sylla's  ghost  and  the 
chorus;  but  in  this  play  no  less  than  in  "Sejanus,"  the 
one  great  object  and  effect  is  not  antiquarian  correct- 
ness, but  the  convincing  presentation  of  character  in 
action.  Shakespeare,  entirely  regardless  of  classic  rule 
or  precedent,  romanticizes  ancient  history  as  he  had 
already  romanticized  the  English  Chronicles. 

Thus  far  we  have  traced  the  course  of  Latin  influence 
as  it  was  exerted  through  the  entire  reign  of  Elizabeth 
upon  a  series  of  courtly  and  scholarly  tragedies  frankly 
artificial  and  remote  from  the  line  of  popular  develop- 
ment. The  continued  aloofness  of  these  plays  from 
general  dramatic  progress  and  their  strict  retention  of 
the  features  of  their  Senecan  model  were  conditioned, 
as  has  been  said,  upon  the  failure  during  the  first 
twenty-five  or  thirty  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign  of  any 
true  feeling  for  tragedy  in  the  competing  native  drama. 
Yet  at  the  close  of  the  period  indicated,  between  the 
years  1585  and  1590,  there  rose  into  sudden  preemi- 


204  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

nence  several  species  of  popular  national  tragedy,  which 
more  than  any  other  single  force  created  the  "Eliza- 
bethan" dramatic  outburst,  and  made  tragedy  during 
the  next  monumental  quarter  century  the  most  vari- 
ous, powerful,  and  expressive  of  all  stage  forms.  It  will 
be  the  function  of  the  remainder  of  this  chapter  and  of 
that  which  follows  to  discuss  the  occasion  and  nature 
of  this  emergence  of  popular  tragedy,  —  the  most  event- 
ful movement,  probably,  in  the  history  of  English 
literature. 

Of  the  several  causes  prerequisite  to  the  growth  of 
English  national  tragedy,  the  most  indispensable  was 
the  example  of  the  Latin  tragic  model.  This  model 
never  received  from  popular  playwrights  the  unreason- 
ing allegiance  offered  by  the  purely  academic  poets, 
but  as  the  imitations  of  the  latter  and  the  general  study 
of  Seneca  and  Horace  brought  it  into  gradual  famili- 
arity during  the  tragic  period  of  incubation  (1560-1585) 
it  exerted  a  strong  influence  both  in  moulding  form  and 
in  shaping  public  taste.  The  denial  to  the  English  popu- 
lace at  the  time  of  Elizabeth's  accession  of  a  proper 
feeling  for  tragedy  does  not,  of  course,  infer  absence  of 
interest  in  the  dramatization  of  serious  stories.  On  the 
contrary,  we  have  pointed  out  in  the  transitional  inter- 
ludes of  that  period  the  constant  search  for  new  plot 
material,  usually  in  the  provinces  of  sober  history  and 
fable.  However,  the  one  desire  of  the  public  to  which 
this  species  of  drama  catered  was  realistic  excite- 
ment, and  there  was  as  yet  no  conception  that  such  a 
demand  could  be  satisfied  by  the  steady  development 
of  a  tragic  theme  to  a  tragic  conclusion/  Pure  Sene- 
can  tragedy,  illustrated  somewhat  fitfully  among  the 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     205 

learned  classes  by  plays  like  "Ferrex  and  Porrex," 
"Gismond  of  Salern,"  and  "The  Misfortunes  of  Ar- 
thur," was  necessarily  caviare  to  the  general,  lack- 
ing as  it  did  the  fundamental  desideratum  of  stage 
action.  No  appreciation  of  the  laws  of  dramatic  tech- 
nique or  of  the  difference  between  comedy  and  tragedy 
appears  in  the  contemporary  productions  of  the  popu- 
lar stage.  Such  are  "King  Darius"  (1565),  R.  B.'s 
"Tragicall  Comedie  of  Apius  and  Virginia"  (1563?), 
J.  Pikering's  "Interlude  of  Vice  Concerning  Horestes" 
(1567),  John  Phillip's  "Commodye  of  pacient  and 
meeke  Grissill"  (1565?),  T.Preston's  "Lamentable 
tragedy  mixed  full  of  pleasant  mirth.conteyningthelife 
of  CambisesKingof  Percia"  (1569-1570);  and  the  med- 
ley which  Elizabeth's  Master  of  the  Chapel  Children 
produced  in  accordance  with  the  public  taste,  "Damon 
and  Pithias."  Most  of  these  plays  have  been  discussed 
in  connection  with  the  transitional  interlude,  and  it  is 
to  that  type  that  they  all  really  belong.  They  make  no 
division  into  acts  or  scenes,  no  attempt  at  consecutive 
plot  development,  and  show  no  knowledge  of  the  rules 
of  modern  dramatic  art.  The  authors  of  these  pieces 
were  concerned,  not  to  supplant  the  old  moral  drama,  < 
but  merely  to  endue  that  outworn  species  with  an  ad- 
ventitious appeal  by  the  addition  of  classic  or  romantic 
story.  In  complete  opposition  to  the  practice  of  the 
imitators  of  Seneca,  the  bloodiest  incidents  in  the  nar- 
ratives treated  are  selected  for  spectacular  and  some- 
times unimaginable  staging.  Virginius  is  instructed  by 
a  stage  direction  to  tie  a  handkerchief  about  his  daugh- 
ter's eyes  and  then  strike  off  her  head,  which  he  imme- 
diately carries  to  Appius.  Sisamnes  is  flayed  on  the 
stage  "with  a  false  skin,"  and  in  the  same  play  ("Cam- 


206  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

bises")  Smirdis  is  provided  with  "a  little  bladder  of 
vinegar,"  which  when  pricked  at  his  murder  may  seem 
to  exude  blood.1 

These  luridly  sensational  scenes,  however,  seldom 
form  the  pith  of  the  plays  in  which  they  occur.  Very 
often  they  are  no  more  than  excrescent  ornaments. 
Whatever  genuine  dramatic  material  there  may  be  is 
taken  in  nearly  every  instance  from  the  old  comic  con- 
vention of  the  interlude;  and  the  entire  failure  of  all 
the  plays  of  the  "  Cambises  "  type  is  the  inevitable  result 
of  the  effort  at  fusing  elements  essentially  discordant. 
The  nearest  approach  to  tragedy  is  found  perhaps  in 
the  play  which  in  title  and  subject  matter  promises 
least:  Phillip's  "Comedy  of  Patient  Grissell."  But 
here  as  elsewhere,  though  the  title-roles  are  given  to 
serious  or  even  tragic  figures,  it  is  the  native  buffoonery 
of  the  interlude  that  holds  the  centre  of  the  stage.  The 
real  hero,  before  whom  the  awkward  lay-figures  of  king 
and  tyrant  seem  colorless,  is  everywhere  the  vice: 
Haphazard  in  "Appius  and  Virginia,"  Ambidexter  in 
"Cambises,"  Politic  Persuasion  in  "Patient  Grissell." 
In  the  most  advanced  play  of  the  class,  "Damon  and 
Pithias," — a  work  which  on  several  sides  shows  kinship 
with  the  contemporary  comedies, — the  humorous  ele- 
ment is  of  two  kinds.  Native  clownage  is  represented 
by  Grim  the  Collier  and  the  two  pages  of  Lylian  type, 
Jack  and  Will :  while  in  Carisophus,  the  parasite,  is  in- 
troduced a  serio-comic  figure  from  classical  drama. 

The  attempt  made  half-heartedly  by  the  authors  of 
these  plays  to  graft  a  plot  of  classic  gravity  upon  the 
amorphous  stock  of  the  native  interlude  was  naturally 

1  Cf.  similar  device  in  the  Canterbury  play  of  Th.  a  Beckett,  Repts. 
Royal  Comm.  Hist.  MSS.  9 1, 148  f,  cited  by  Creizenach,  iii,  496. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     207 

an  artistic  failure.  Yet  the  works  appealed  notwith- 
standing to  the  broad  public  before  which  they  were 
mostly  performed,  and  they  did  much  to  foster  a  gen- 
uine, if  for  the  present  unreasoning,  taste  for  tragic 
situation,  intermingled  with  farce  and  romance.  The 
"  Cambises  "  vein  persisted,  and  furnished  Shakespeare 
with  matter  for  unconscious  imitation  as  well  as  laugh- 
ter. True  English  tragedy  arose  from  a  compromise 
between  native  and  classic  influences,  and  it  arose 
largely  in  answer  to  the  popular  demand  created  by 
plays  of  the  "Cambises"  type;  but  it  was  not  discov- 
ered in  the  path  which  those  dramas  blazed.  Success- 
ful tragedy,  when  it  came,  resulted,  not  from  the  effort 
to  pack  a  sensational  story  upon  the  slender  and  ill- 
articulated  frame  of  the  interlude,  but  from  the  thor- 
ough adaptation  of  the  more  resourceful  Latin  model 
to  national  uses  and  traditions.  Transitional  inter- 
ludes like  "Cambises"  prepared  the  public  between 
1560  and  1580  to  appreciate  the  stage  presentation  of 
grave  worldly  issues,  and  national  tragedy  emerged 
when  plays  of  the  general  Senecan  mould  began  to  be 
adapted  to  suit  the  expectations  of  the  democratic 
public  thus  created. 

One  of  the  first  popular  English  tragedies  may  well 
be  "Locrine,"  though  the  revised  version  in  which  the 
play  is  preserved  can  hardly  antedate  1591. l  This 
drama,  the  obvious  work  of  a  scholar,  is  formed  upon 
the  general  lines  of  the  academic  Senecan  tragedy,  but 
it  is  developed  in  harmony  with  the  tastes  of  a  demo- 
cratic rather  than  a  learned  audience.  The  theme,  like 

1  Because  of  certain  clear  borrowings  from  Spenser's  Complaints, 
published  1591.  But  the  extant  edition  (1595)  distinctly  states  the 
pluy  to  be  "  Newly  set  foorth,  overseene  and  corrected." 


208  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

those  of  "Ferrex  and  Porrex"  and  "The  Misfortunes 
of  Arthur,"  is  drawn  from  the  mythical  history  of 
Britain, — a  theme  abounding  in  horror  and  bloodshed. 
Instead  of  the  single  ghost  of'"Thyestes,"  we  have  here 
two;  and  the  favorite  motives  of  Seneca  —  battle, 
murder,  suicide,  adultery,  and  domestic  strife  —  are 
all  repeated  with  the  most  lurid  heightening.  With  the 
classicizing  subject  there  goes  no  trace  of  the  classical 
restraint :  the  utmost  reaches  of  torment  and  atrocity 
are  brought  before  the  eyes  of  the  spectators  and  exag- 
gerated with  every  device  of  lyric  declamation.  The 
act  and  scene  division  of  classic  art  is  accompanied  by 
a  violation  of  the  unities  hardly  less  flagrant  than  that 
which  Sidney  fancifully  portrays  in  his  picture  of  the 
crudities  of  contemporary  drama.1  The  action  ranges 
wildly  over  the  whole  of  Britain,  and  covers  a  full  gen- 
eration. From  the  courtly  tragedies,  the  author  of 
"Locrine"  has  inherited  the  dumb-show,  while  in  con- 
formity with  the  practice  of  popular  drama  he  has 
introduced  extended  comic  scenes,  partly  altogether 
anachronistic,  partly  cohering  by  only  the  slightest 
thread  with  the  rest  of  the  story.  "Locrine"  is  neither 
an  admirable  nor  even  a  reputable  tragedy,  but  it 
shows  more  promise  than  any  other  which  has  been 
hitherto  considered.  It  combines  in  its  loose  and 
tangled  structure  all  the  salient  features  of  the  native 
and  the  imported  methods.  It  displays  a  healthy  desire 
to  present  life  frankly  and  freely,  without  exclusion 
either  of  comic  or  tragic  incident,  and  in  the  way  most 
impressive  to  the  general  spectator.  It  gives  evidence 
of  the  availability  of  the  materials  of  tragedy  and  indi- 
cates the  existence  of  an  untrained  taste  for  tragic 
1  Apologie  for  Poctrie,  52. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     209 

entertainment.  To  make  of  it  a  tragedy  in  the  true 
sense  there  was  lacking  only  the  selective  and  refining 
power  of  individual  genius. 

This  genius  appeared  in  Thomas  Kyd,  by  all  odds 
the  greatest  benefactor  of  Senecan  tragedy  in  England. 
Kyd  found  tragic  drama  an  undomesticated  stray,  on 
the  one  hand  barely  keeping  up  a  precarious  existence 
in  the  fashionable  shows  produced  at  court  and  college; 
on  the  other  hand  waging  a  blind  and  losing  battle  on 
the  popular  stage  against  the  vigorous  comic  tradition 
of  the  time.  Since  the  first  production  of  "The  Spanish 
Tragedy,"  about  1587,  the  English  equivalent  of  Sene- 
can melodrama  has  never  lost  its  hold  on  vulgar  au- 
diences. This  play  is  in  many  ways  a  much  truer  rep- 
resentative of  Seneca  than  confessed  imitations  like 
"Ferrex  and  Porrex."  Kyd's  dramatic  eye  seized  at 
once  the  strong  point  of  the  Senecan  type,  —  its  power 
of  arousing  horror  and  excitement.  By  abandoning  al- 
together the  conventional  practice  of  indicating  action 
at  second  hand  through  the  mouths  of  messengers,  and 
by  supplanting  the  archaic  mythological  plot,  which 
Norton  and  Hughes  had  endeavored  vainly  to  resus- 
citate, by  a  modern  theme  of  love  and  political  in- 
trigue, Kyd  was  enabled  to  approach  the  nearer  to  the 
actual  spirit  of  Latin  tragedy.  The  chorus,  the  ghost, 
and  the  spectacular  peculiarities  of  Senecan  plot  re- 
main; but  they  are  vitalized  by  Kyd's  manipulations 
till  they  reveal  dramatic  powers  far  beyond  the  vision 
of  antiquarian  reactionaries  like  Hughes,  —  far  even 
beyond  what  Seneca  himself  perceived.  The  progeny 
of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy"  is  infinite.  "The  Jew  of 
Malta,"  " Titus  Andronicus,"  and  "Hamlet "are  all, on 
one  side,  at  least,  its  direct  descendants;  and  what 


210  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

each  of  these  owes  to  Kyd's  play  is  precisely  what  the 
latter  had  derived  from  the  judicious  imitation  of 
Seneca. 

The  "Tragedy  of  Blood,"  thus  inaugurated  by  Kyd, 
depends  for  success  upon  the  presentation  of  sensa- 
tional action  in  the  development  of  a  more  or  less 
consecutive  plot.  To  this  sensational  interest  —  the 
characteristic  feature  of  melodrama  —  all  ethical  and 
psychological  aims  are  subordinated.  The  promise 
made  by  Revenge  at  the  beginning  of  "  The  Spanish 
Tragedy"  to  the  ghost  of  Andrea,-— 

"Thou  shall  see  the  author  of  thy  death, 
Don  Balthazar,  the  Prince  of  Portingale, 
Depriu'd  of  life  by  Bel-imperia,"  — 

is  recalled  to  the  memory  of  the  spectators  at  the  end 
of  each  act;  and  it  is  the  prosecution  of  this  action, 
together  with  the  parallel  vengeance  of  Hieronimo  for 
Horatio's  murder,  that  furnishes  the  play  with  purpose 
and  continuous  interest  through  its  four  otherwise 
wandering  acts.  Moral  import  is  entirely  without  the 
scope  of  this  type  of  drama;  there  is  no  thought  of 
picturing  the  avengers  as  more  amiable  or  more  noble- 
minded  than  their  victims.  The  tone  of  the  play  is 
frankly  that  of  the  vendetta,  and  the  author  accepts 
savage  conditions  as  he  finds  them  without  essaying 
any  interpretation  of  life's  problems. 

Nor  does  "  The  Spanish  Tragedy  "  seriously  attempt 
the  portrayal  of  individual  character.  With  two  excep- 
tions, the  delineation  of  the  figures  is  not  only  crude, 
but  obviously  careless  and  perfunctory,  —  the  work  of 
a  man  absorbed  entirely  in  action  and  devoid  of  sym- 
pathy with  the  actors.  Two  characters  in  the  play 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY    «11 

have,  however,  received  Kyd's  attention  and  possess 
distinctive  traits,  because  in  each  case  their  portrayal 
offered  opportunity  for  melodramatic  effect.  The  treat- 
ment of  Hieronimo's  madness,  glaringly  unnatural  as 
it  is,  made  excellent  stage  business,  and  impressed  itself 
ineradicably  upon  the  contemporary  public,  furnishing 
the  sub-title  of  the  play  in  later  printed  editions,1  and 
the  subject  of  the  extensive  interpolations  ascribed  to 
the  pen  of  Jonson.  The  exploitation  of  insanity  be- 
came, indeed,  one  of  the  marked  features  of  Kydian 
tragedy,  even  outvaluing  as  a  theatrical  asset  the  in- 
herited Senecan  ghost. 

In  his  portrayal  of  Lorenzo,  Kyd  manifests  again  an 
apparent  interest  in  character,  founded  not  upon  psy- 
chological discernment,  but  upon  his  recognition  of  the 
spectacular  possibilities  of  the  type.  Lorenzo  is  the 
first  of  a  long  line  of  Machiavellian  villains,  whose  pop- 
ularity with  a  sensation-loving  public  was  in  no  degree 
impaired  by  the  palpable  improbabilities  and  limita- 
tions in  their  presentment.  He  is  the  original  progeni- 
tor of  the  villain  of  modern  melodrama.  In  contrast 
with  the  great  tragic  heroes  of  Shakespeare,  the  species 
lost  prestige;  but  when  first  introduced  upon  the  stage, 
there  was  a  zest  hitherto  inspired  by  no  dramatic  figure 
about  this  ardent  devotee  of  policy  who  could  "smile 
and  smile  and  be  a  villain,"  —  who,  utterly  soulless  and 
heartless,  could  composedly  intrigue  out  of  his  way  the 
innocent  obstacles  to  his  ends,  and,  if  necessary,  could 
meet  his  own  fate  with  a  like  egotistical  composure. 
This  is,  of  course,  a  low  ideal  of  tragic  character,  born 
of  the  primitive  philosophy  that  makes  sang-froid  and 

1  In  the  1615  (seventh)  and  subsequent  editions,  the  title  runs, 
"The  Spanish  Tragedie:  Or,  Hieronimo  is  mad  againe." 


212  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

remorseless  efficiency  the  justification  of  all  guile;  but 
its  rich  potentialities  for  thrilling  action  gave  it  on  the 
untutored  tragic  stage  an  irresistible  vogue.  Its  influ- 
ence was  strong  enough  to  cause  Marlowe,  who  knew 
well  a  higher  form  of  tragedy,  to  sacrifice  the  great 
psychological  and  poetic  opportunity  of  his  "Jew  of 
Malta";  and  in  the  figure  of  Young  Mortimer  it  again 
introduced  a  coarse  thread  into  the  delicate  character- 
ization of  the  same  author's  "  Edward  II."  It  was  one 
of  the  determining  factors  that  moulded  the  youthful 
work  of  Shakespeare,  inspiring  his  Aaron  in  "Titus 
Andronicus,"  his  Richard  III,  and  Margaret  of  Anjou, 
and  coloring  deeply  his  whole  idea  of  tragic  character, 
till  Marlowe's  example  and  the  experience  of  life  taught 
him  a  purer  art.  Traces  of  the  same  conception  of  the 
hero- villain  show  themselves  in  "Hamlet,"  probably 
as  a  heritage  from  Kyd  rather  than  from  Shakespeare; 
and  the  type  continues  unchanged  in  the  main  char- 
acters of  Chettle's  "Hoffman,"  of  Barnes's  "Devil's 
Charter,"  of  "Lust's  Dominion,"  and  "Alphonsus  of 
Germany." 

Lorenzo  indicates  his  character  and  that  of  the  spe- 
cies to  which  he  belongs  in  the  words  of  his  soliloquy 
concerning  his  servant-accomplices,  Pedringano  and 
Serberine  (III,  iii,  111-119):  — 

"  As  for  my  selfe,  I  know  my  secret  fault, 
And  so  doe  they;  but  I  have  dealt  for  them. 
They  that  for  coine  their  soules  endangered, 
To  sane  my  life,  for  coyne  shall  venture  theirs: 
And  better  its  that  base  companions  dye, 
Then  by  their  life  to  hazard  our  good  haps. 
Nor  shall  they  liue,  for  me  to  feare  their  faith: 
He  trust  my  selfe,  my  selfe  shall  be  my  friend; 
For  dye  they  shall,  slaucs  are  ordeined  to  no  other  end." 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     £13 

The  source  of  this  crude  conception  of  life  and  char- 
acter, which  Kyd  made  one  of  the  assets  of  cheap  trag- 
edy, is  to  be  found  in  the  contemporary  attitude  toward 
the  works  of  Machiavelli,  one  of  the  most  talked  of 
writers  of  the  age,  and  a  particularly  well-known  figure 
on  the  stage.1  It  has  been  shown  that  the  tenets  of  the 
Italian  policist  were  most  familiar  in  the  exaggerated 
form  in  which  they  were  represented  by  a  French  op- 
ponent, Innocent  Gentillet.  Gentillet's  work,  which 
by  attacking  the  Satanic  shrewdness  and  egotism  of 
Machiavelli's  doctrine,  gave  an  enormous  notoriety  to 
the  philosophy  of  the  latter,  was  translated  by  Simon 
Patericke  as  early  as  1577,  and  several  times  published 
under  the  title:  "A  discourse  upon  the  Meanes  of  Well 
Governing  and  Maintaining  in  good  Peace,  a  King- 
dom, or  other  Principality  —  Against  Nicholas  Machi- 
avell  the  Florentine."  A  passage  from  Patericke's 
Epistle  Dedicatory  will  indicate  the  conception  of 
Machiavellianism  which  this  work  disseminated:  "For 
then  Sathan  being  a  disguised  person  amongst  the 
French,  in  the  likenesse  of  a  merry  ieaster  [i.  e.,  Rabe- 
lais] acted  a  Comoedie,  but  shortly  ensued  a  wofull 
Tragedie.  When  our  countriemens  minds  were  sick, 
and  corrupted  with  these  pestilent  diseases,  and  that 
discipline  waxed  stale;  then  came  forth  the  books  of 
Machiavell,  a  most  pernicious  writer,  which  began  not 
in  secret  and  stealing  manner  (as  did  those  former 
vices)  but  by  open  meanes,  and  as  it  were  a  continual! 
assault,  utterly  destroyed,  not  this  or  that  vertue,  but 
even  all  vertues  at  once:  Insomuch  as  it  tooke  Faith 
from  the  princes;  authoritie  and  maiestie  from  lawes; 

1  See  the  valuable  dissertation  of  Edward  Meyer,  "Machiavelli 
and  the  Elizabethan  Drama,"  Litterarhiylorische  Fortchungen,  I. 


214  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

libertie  from  the  people,  and  peace  and  concord  from 
all  persons."  The  frank  diabolism  here  attributed  to 
the  Florentine  provided  Kyd  with  an  effective  ready- 
made  character  for  his  intriguing  prince,  Lorenzo;  and, 
in  consequence  of  Kyd's  successful  employment,  cre- 
ated a  permanent  stage  type  which  long  retained  its 
popularity  in  the  face  of  all  efforts  at  psychological 
truth. 

"The  Spanish  Tragedy"  virtually  created  a  great 
deal  of  Elizabethan  stage  business.  Depending  alto- 
gether upon  spectacular  effect,  in  entire  indifference 
to  moral  purpose  and  truth  of  characterization,  Kyd 
raised  tragedy  at  a  single  bound  to  a  position  decid- 
edly higher  in  vulgar  favor  than  that  occupied  by  the 
previously  dominant  comedy.  "The  Spanish  Tragedy  " 
received  and  merited  more  both  of  popularity  and  of 
derision  than  any  other  play,  probably,  which  the  six- 
teenth century  produced;  and  it  was  everywhere  imi- 
tated. Besides  his  clever  adaptation  of  Senecan  con- 
vention to  the  taste  of  his  time,  and  his  creation  of  the 
stock  types  already  referred  to,  Kyd  inaugurated  in 
this  play  a  greater  variety  of  plot  devices  which  per- 
sisted in  the  later  drama  than  can  easily  be  enumer- 
ated. The  idyllic  garden  scene  between  Horatio  and 
Bel-Imperia,  setting  off  the  tragedy  that  environs  it; 
the  play  within  the  play  of  the  last  act;  the  employ- 
ment of  the  dumb-show,  no  longer  as  a  mere  prelude, 
but  as  an  integral  part  of  the  drama; x  the  dialogue  of 
Andrea  and  Revenge,  encompassing  and  interpreting 
the  entire  course  of  events;  the  carefully  articulated 
sub-plot  of  Serberine  and  Pedringano,  filling  out  and 
relieving  with  its  grim  humor  the  bleak  horror  of  the 
1  Cf.  Ill,  xv,  28  ff  and  Macbeth,  IV,  i. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY    215 

main  tragedy :  each  of  these  elements  —  the  result  of 
Kyd's  quick  sense  of  striking  effect  —  passed  into  the 
common  stock  of  the  theatre,  and  repeated  itself  in 
numerous  variations  in  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  and 
his  contemporaries. 

The  enormous  success  of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy" 
inspired  two  other  plays,  which  courted  popularity  by 
a  treatment  of  the  same  themes.  "The  First  Part  of 
Jeronimo,  With  the  Warre  of  Portugall,  and  the  life  and 
death  of  Don  Andrsea"  (1605)  is  a  crude  sketch  of 
the  antecedent  history  of  the  Spanish  and  Portuguese 
courts.  The  general  appearance  of  plagiarism  about 
this  piece  and  the  many  contradictions  in  the  presenta- 
tion of  the  main  figures  of  the  two  plays  show  "Jeron- 
imo" to  be  almost  certainly  the  effort  of  a  theatrical 
hack  to  deck  himself  in  borrowed  glory. 

"The  Tragedy  of  Solyman  and  Perseda"  (1592?), 
though  published  anonymously,  and  lacking  decisive 
evidence  of  authorship,  is  now  more  generally  accepted 
as  Kyd's.  It  is  an  amplification  into  a  five-act  tragedy 
of  the  same  story1  which  had  previously  furnished 
the  material  for  Hieronimo's  interpolated  play;  and  it 
possesses  considerable  interest  as  showing  how  the  in- 
novations of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy"  fared  in  later 
practice.  "Soliman  and  Perseda"  is  a  work  of  greater 
polish  and  much  less  originality  than  the  earlier  play, 
but  it  shows  the  same  general  characteristics.  It  is  not 
at  all  surprising  that  Kyd  should  have  exhausted  his 
imagination  in  the  prodigality  of  intrigue  and  inci- 
dent which  mark  his  first  play.  The  later  effort  has 

1  This  story  seems  to  have  reached  Kyd  in  Henry  Wot  ton's 
Courtly  Controversy  of  Cupid's  Caulels  (1578),  a  collection  of  five 
tales  translated  from  the  French  of  Jacques  Yver. 


216  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

little  of  the  uncouth  energy  of  language  and  action 
which  made  "The  Spanish  Tragedy"  ridiculous  to 
critics,  but  enormously  influential.  None  of  the  serious 
characters  in  "Soliman  and  Perseda"  possesses  the  in- 
terest which  attaches  to  Hieronimo  and  Lorenzo;  yet 
the  later  play  is  obviously  better  balanced  and  ma- 
turer.  Equally  with  the  other  it  depends  for  its  appeal 
upon  the  portrayal  of  physical  action  of  a  bloody  and 
surprising  nature;  and  its  plot,  though  neatly  worked 
out,  is  even  more  entirely  a  narrative  of  consecutive 
events,  closely  following  its  novelistic  source,  and  lack- 
ing the  unity  which  the  figures  of  Andrea  and  Revenge 
give  to  "The  Spanish  Tragedy."  The  main  superiority 
of  "  Soliman  and  Perseda  "  lies  in  the  comic  scenes,  where 
the  humors  of  Piston  and  Basilisco,  though  quite  con- 
ventional, are  well  handled;  and  in  an  increased  sanity 
throughout.  By  most  rules,  "Soliman  and  Perseda" 
should  be  a  better  play  than  its  predecessor;  but,  in 
fact,  it  has  hardly  a  tithe  of  the  interest  of  "The  Span- 
ish Tragedy,"  either  for  the  critic  or  the  reader.  It  is 
an  instructive  failure,  marking  clearly  the  superficial- 
ity and  insipidity  which  were  inherent  in  the  melo- 
drama, but  which  the  very  fault  of  "The  Spanish 
Tragedy "  —  its  violent  excess  —  served  largely  to 
disguise.  Along  the  path  which  Kyd  had  outlined,  no 
true  advance  in  tragedy  was  possible.  His  first  play, 
struck  out  wildly  in  the  flush  of  invention,  remained 
the  best  of  its  type;  and  in  spite  of  its  immense  vogue 
and  the  enormous  gain  in  dramatic  technique  which  it 
accomplished,  it  proved  to  its  closest  imitators  a  very 
misleading  guide. 

The  reason  for  this  is  simple.   Kyd  brought  within 
the  range  of  tragedy  all  the  forces  by  which  an  audi- 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     217 

ence  might  be  moved,  except  only  the  portrayal  of  hu- 
man character.  That  he  entirely  ignored.  In  conse- 
quence, the  plays  of  Kyd's  type  betray  their  lack  of 
this  fundamental  requisite  of  all  healthy  drama  only 
the  more  clearly  in  proportion  as  they  gnow  saner  in 
other  respects.  The  tragic  form  which  Kyd,  with  gen- 
ius almost  creative,  had  evolved  from  the  Senecan  tra- 
dition was  for  the  present  little  more  than  an  empty 
shell.  In  the  case  of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy,"  the 
author  tempered  the  barren  coldness  of  his  imaginary 
world  by  the  artificial  heat  of  lurid  incident;  but  the 
human  warmth  which  he  did  not  find  in  Seneca  he  was 
not  able  to  impart.  It  was  only  after  Marlowe  had 
breathed  into  tragedy  the  vital  spirit  of  psychological 
truth  that  the  English  theatre  was  prepared  to  develop 
effectively  the  technical  form  which  Kyd  had  invented. 
The  most  immediate  inheritors  of  the  wealth  of 
Senecan  melodrama  brought  into  currency  by  "The 
Spanish  Tragedy"  were  the  "Ur-Hamlet"  and  "Titus 
Andronicus,"  plays  which  abundantly  shared  with  the 
older  work  both  in  the  plaudits  of  the  groundlings  and 
in  the  derision  of  more  refined  tastes.  The  early  "Ham-  * 
let"  —unfortunately  no  longer  extant  in  its  original 
form  —  seems  to  have  been  written  by  Kyd  himself 
about  1589.  Even  in  the  two  greatly  humanized  and 
intellectualized  versions  of  Shakespeare  the  parallelism 
with  "The  Spanish  Tragedy"  is  continually  forced 
upon  the  reader  in  the  typically  Kydian  theme  of  all 
engulfing  revenge,  and  in  the  spectacular  use  of  the 
ghost,  the  play  within  the  play,  and  the  manifold  vari- 
ations of  heroic  insanity.  Here  also,  as  in  "The  Span- 
ish Tragedy"  and  nearly  all  the  plays  of  its  class,  the 
mark  of  Seneca's  over-reflective  style  stands  conspicu- 


218  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

ous  in  the  penchant  for  extended  soliloquy  and  self- 
analysis. 

"Titus  Andronicus"  is  another  drama  in  which  the 
morbid  craze  for  vengeance  is  traced  through  an  orgy 
of  undiscriminating  slaughter.  First  printed  in  1594, 
the  tragedy  is  stated  to  have  been  played  sundry 
times  by  the  companies  of  the  Earl  of  Pembroke,  the 
Earl  of  Derby  (later  the  Lord  Chamberlain's),  and  the 
Earl  of  Sussex.  This  advertisement  links  "Titus  An- 
dronicus" with  the  second  and  third  parts  of  "Henry 
VI,"  which  were  likewise  acted  both  by  the  Earl  of 
Pembroke's  Men  and  by  those  of  the  Strange-Derby- 
Chamberlain  Company.1  Thus,  it  seems  likely  that 
Shakespeare  began  his  career  as  a  tragic  writer  in 
"Titus  Andronicus"  precisely  in  the  manner  in  which 
he  began  his  concern  with  the  history  play:  as  the  re- 
viser, that  is,  for  his  company's  use  of  a  striking  but 
inartistic  drama  that  had  already  attained  notoriety 
upon  a  different  stage. 

The  peculiar  strength  and  weakness  of  Senecan 
melodrama  are  well  illustrated,  perhaps,  by  the  coin- 
cidence that  four  of  the  most  conspicuous  examples 
of  the  type,  all  belonging  to  the  period  1590-1603, 
found  their  way  into  print  only  a  generation  or  more 
after  composition.  That  they  should  have  remained 
extant  for  so  long  in  theatrical  archives,  and  at  the  end 
of  that  period  have  been  still  found  worthy  of  revision 
and  publication,  shows  the  permanent  hold  which  they 

1  The  1595  edition  of  The  True  Tragedy  of  Richard  Duke  of  York, 
the  earliest  version  of  Henry  VI,  Pt.  HI,  declares  that  play  to  have 
been  acted  by  Lord  Pembroke's  Men,  and  the  close  connection  of  the 
True  Tragedy  with  the  earlier  First  Part  of  the  Contention  makes  it 
certain  that  the  two  dramas  belonged  to  the  same  company. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     219 

had  upon  vulgar  fancy.  On  the  other  hand,  the  pub- 
Ushers'  previous  neglect  of  plays  so  certainly  notori-0 
ous  on  the  stage  may  not  unjustly  be  ascribed  to  their 
obvious  lack  of  psychological  truth  and  literary  polish. 

Of  these  four  melodramas,  "The  Jew  of  Malta," 
Marlowe's  only  accepted  production  in  the  species,  was  I 
written  about  1590,  and  acted  with  extraordinary  sue-  1 
cess  by  Henslowe's  Company  between  1592  and  1596.  | 
Though  licensed  for  publication  in  1594,  no  edition  is 
known  prior  to  1633,  when  the  tragedy  was  printed 
after  having  been  revived  both  at  the  Cockpit  Theatre 
and  at  Court.  "Lust's  Dominion,  or  The  Lascivious 
Queen,"  was  first  published  in  1657  as  "A  Tragedie 
Written  by  Christopher  Marlowe,  Gent."  In  its  lurid 
picture  of  vice  in  high  places,  and  in  the  portraiture  of 
its  hero-villain  Eleazar,  the  Machiavellian  Moor,  this 
play  is  a  companion-piece  to  "Titus  Andronicus,"  by 
which  it  was  probably  suggested.  The  ascription  to 
Marlowe  seems  to  be  unsupported  by  any  evidence, 
and  probably  originated  with  the  untrustworthy  pub- 
lisher of  the  1657  edition,  Francis  Kirkman.  Collier 
identified  "Lust's  Dominion"  with  "The  Spanish 
Moor's  Tragedy"  by  Dekker,  Haughton,  and  Day, 
mentioned  in  Henslowe's  Diary  for  January,  1600,  but 
it  seems  probable  that  the  former  piece  took  its  first 
form  a  decade  earlier. 

The  very  interesting  melodrama  "  Alphonsus  of  Ger- 
many," published  1654,  appears,  like  the  plays  just 
mentioned,  to  date  from  a  period  little  subsequent  to 
1590.  Throughout  this  drama  Machiavellianism  is 
rampant  in  the  schemes  and  character  of  the  titular 
hero;  and  the  old  theme  of  revenge  for  a  father  presents 
itself  anew  in  Alphonsus's  dupe  and  fool,  Alexander  de 


220  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Cyprus,  together  with  many  subordinate  horrors  and 
much  carefully  constructed  machinery  of  plot  and  sub- 
*plot. 

Chettle's  "Hoffman,"  mentioned  by  Henslowe  in 
1602,  is  the  fourth  of  these  wild  stage  plays,  which  were 
destined  to  wait  long  for  publication.  It  exists  only  in 
a  text  printed  in  1631.  Together  with  Marston's  con- 
temporary "History  of  Antonio  and  Mellida,"  in  two 
parts,  and  the  Shakespearean  "Hamlet,"  it  makes  up  a 
group  illustrative  of  the  vogue  of  the  Senecan  revenge 
play  at  the  very  close  of  the  Tudor  period.  "Hamlet" 
is  the  link  which  binds  this  series  to  the  earlier  group 
of  plays  immediately  inspired  by  "The  Spanish  Trag- 
edy." "Hamlet"  is,  furthermore,  the  only  connecting 
medium  between  this  entire  brutal  species  and  the  per- 
manent interests  of  art  and  humanity. 

Senecan  melodrama  did  not  end  with  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth.  Perhaps  it  has  never  met  a  complete  check. 
But  in  the  plays  which  follow  "Hamlet,"  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  classic  connection  disappears,  and  a  differ- 
ent moral  tone  is  perceived.  Traces  of  the  old  spirit 
remain  in  "The  Devil's  Charter"  by  Barnabe  Barnes 
(1607),  a  fetid  story  of  Borgian  crime  and  trickery, 
which  hardly  justifies  the  suggestion  of  supernatural 
agencies  conveyed  in  the  title;  and  in  Chapman's  "Re- 
venge of  Bussy  D'Ambois"  (1610).  In  general,  how- 
ever, the  transition  from  what  is,  at  worst,  the  honest 
bestiality  of  "The  Spanish  Tragedy"  and  "Titus  An- 
dronicus"  to  the  insidious  pessimism  of  Jacobean 
revenge  plays  like  "The Revenger's  Tragedy"  of  Tour- 
neur  (1607)  arises  from  an  opposition  in  taste  that  is 
fundamental  and  irreconcilable. 

Even  the  Elizabethan  popular  expressions  of  the 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     221 

Senecan  influence,  though  exhaling  a  far  less  poisonous 
atmosphere  than  the  terrible  murder  tragedies  of  Web- 
ster and  Tourneur,  make  woefully  unexhilarating  read- 
ing. They  leave  the  student  parched  for  a  breath  of 
imaginative  sympathy  or  ideal  nobility.  Only  in  a 
single  play  from  the  Senecan  tradition  does  one  find 
that  flavor  of  romance  and  human  sweetness  which 
raises  melodrama  above  sordidness.  Naturally  enough, 
it  is  in  the  tragedy  of  Shakespeare  that  stands  inter- 
mediate in  date  between  his  slight  retouching  of  the 
ghastly  "Titus  Andronicus"  and  his  masterly  trans- 
formation of  the  almost  equally  ghastly  old  "Hamlet" 
into  an  imaginative  tragedy  of  quite  different  charac- 
ter. In  the  impression  which  it  leaves  upon  the  reader 
"Romeo  and  Juliet"  is  far  removed  from  any  of  the 
plays  we  have  discussed,  but  fundamentally  it  belongs 
to  the  progeny  of  Senecan  tragedy.  The  root  idea  of 
family  feud,  hardly  less  bitter  than  in  the  "Thebais" 
or  "Titus  Andronicus"  ;  the  violent  nature  of  the  ac- 
tion and  tremendous  effusion  of  blood,  involving  not 
only  the  immediate  protagonists,  but  also  such  guiltless 
non-partisans  as  Mercutio  and  the  County  Paris,  re- 
late the  play  organically  to  the  "Spanish  Tragedy" 
class.  And  the  same  relationship  appears  in  the  han- 
dling of  the  plot :  in  the  elevation  of  passion  above  char-  / 
acter,  and  in  the  neglect  of  reason  and  ordered  argu- 
ment in  the  pursuit  of  lyric  declamation.  Of  course, 
the  pure  beauty  of  the  main  story,  beside  which  even 
the  love  scenes  between  Horatio  and  Bel-Imperia  seem  l 
gross  and  shallow,  owes  nothing  to  Seneca.  So,  it  is  an 
original  reform  of  Shakespeare  to  contradict  the  dia- 
bolism toward  which  the  species  often  tended,  and  out 
of  evil  still  to  find  means  of  good,  showing  how  the 


222  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"star-crossed  lovers  .  .  .  Do  with  their  death  bury  their 
parents'  strife,"  and  how  the  final  result  of  all  the  tem- 
pest of  passion  is  the  reestablishment  of  amity  and 
order.  It  is  by  reading  "Romeo  and  Juliet"  that  one 
takes  most  pleasing  leave  of  the  classic-born  tragedy  of 
blood.  This  play  shows  little,  to  be  sure,  of  the  Mar- 
lovian  soul-study  which  was  already  broadening  and 
ennobling  tragedy.  Yet  it  is  pervaded  by  a  spirit 
equally  rare,  and  it  suggests  that  the  key  to  the  portal 
which  leads  from  melodrama  to  true  human  tragedy 
lay  perhaps  not  solely  in  the  hands  of  Marlowe. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

GENERAL  DISCUSSION 

Churchill,  G.  B.  and  Keller,  W.  :  "  Die  lateinischen  Univer- 

sitats-Drameu  Englands  in  der  Zeit  der  Konigin  Elizabeth," 

Sh.  Jb.  xxxiv  (1898). 
Cunliffe,  J.  "W.  :   '<  The  Influence  of  Seneca  on  Elizabethan 

Tragedy,"  London,  1893. 
"  Italian  Prototypes  of  the  Masque  and  Dumb  Show," 

PubL  Mod.  Lang.  Ass.,  xxii  (1907),  140-156. 
Fischer,  R.  :  "  Zur  Kunstentwicklung  der  englischen  Tragodie 

von  ihren  ersten  Anfangeu  bis  zu  Shakespeare,"  Strassburg, 

1893. 
Moorman,  F.  W.  :  "  The  Pre-Shakespearean   Ghost,"   Mod. 

Lang.  Review,  i  (1906). 
Thorndike,  A.  H. :  "  Tragedy,"   Types  of  English  Literature 

Series,  1908. 
"  The  Relations  of  Hamlet  to  Contemporary  Revenge 

Plays,"  PubL  Mod.  Lang.  Ass.,  xvii  (1902),  125-220. 

INDIVIDUAL  TEXTS 

I.  ELIZABETHAN  TRANSLATIONS  OF  CLASSIC  TRAGEDY 

SENECA  :  His  Tenne  Tragedies,  translated  into  Englysh, 
1581.  (By  various  hands  ;  edited  by  Thomas  Newton.)  Re- 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  LN  TRAGEDY     223 

printed,  Spenser  Society,  vols.  xliii,  xliv,  1847.  Discussion :  E.  M. 
Spearing,  "  The  Elizabethan  '  Tenne  Tragedies  of  Seneca,' " 
Mod.  Lang.  Review,  iv  (1909),  437-461.  Individual  editions. 
Seven  of  the  translations  included  above  were  published 
separately,  viz. :  Troas  (1559),  Thyestes  (1560),  and  Hercules 
Furens  (1561)  by  Jasper  Heywood  ;  (Edipus  (1563)  by 
.  Alexander  Nevyle  ;  Agamemnon  (1566)  and  Medea  (1566)  by 
John  Studley  ;  Octavia  (n.  d.)  by  T.  N(ace).  The  three 
other  plays,  first  included  in  the  1581  edition,  are :  Hippolytus 
and  Hercules  CEtceus  by  John  Studley  and  Thebais  by  Thomas 
Newton.  The  translation  of  a  choral  passage  in  Hercules 
(Etasus  by  Queen  Elizabeth  is  extant  in  MS.,  and  was  printed 
in  Anglia,  xiv  (1892),  346-352. 

EURIPIDES  :  Iphlgenia  at  Aulis.  MS.  translation  by  Lady 
Lumley  in  Brit.  Mus.  Printed  G.  Becker,  Sh.  Jb.  xlvi 
(1910)  ;  Malone  Society.  [Gascoigne's  and  Kinwelmersh's 
Jocasta,  though  claiming  to  be  a  translation  from  the  Greek 
of  Euripides  (PhcenisscE),  does  not  really  merit  inclusion  under 
this  head.  See  below,  p.  224  f .] 

II.  ACADEMIC  AND  AMATEUR  TRAGEDIES  SHOWING  SENECAN 
INFLUENCE 

A.  ACADEMIC  TRAGEDIES  DIRECTLY  INFLUENCED  BT  SENECA 

NORTON,  THOMAS,  and  SACKVILLE,  THOMAS.    Ferrez    and 

Porrex.  The  text  survives  in  two  forms:  — 

(a)  Pirated  edition :  "  The  tragedie  of  Gorboduc,  whereof 
three  Actes  were  wrytten  by  Thomas  Nortone,  and  the 
two  laste  by  Thomas  Sackvyle.  Sette  forthe  as  the 
same  was  shewed  before  the  Quenes  most  excellent 
Maiestie,  in  her  highnes  Court  of  Whitehall,  the  .rviij. 
day  of  January,  Anno  Domini  1561  (1562).  By  the 
Gentleman  of  Thynner  Temple  in  London."  1565.  Re- 
printed, 1590,  as  appendix  to  Lydgate's  "Serpent  of 
Deuision.  Wherein  is  conteined  the  true  History  or 
Mappe  of  Koines  ouerthrowe." 

(6)  M  The  Tragidie  of  Ferrex  and  Porrex,  set  forth  without 
addition  or  alteration  but  altogether  as  the  same  was 
shewed  on  stage  before  the  Queenes  Maiestie,  about 
nine  yeares  past,  vz.  the  xviij.  day  of  lanuarie.  1561. 


224  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

by  the  gentlemen  of  the  Inner  Temple."  n.  d.  (ca. 
1570)  Facsimile,  Farmer,  1908.  Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all 
edd.  except  Hazlitt's  ;  T.  Hawkins,  Origin  of  the  Eng- 
lish Drama,  ii,  1773 ;  Ancient  British  Drama,  i,  1810  ; 
W.  D.  Cooper,  Shakespeare  Society,  xxxvi,  1847  (with 
Ralph  Roister  Doister)  ;  R.  W.  Sackville-West,  The 
Works  of  Thomas  Sackville,  1859  ;  L.  T.  Smith,  Engl. 
Sprach-  u.  Litteraturdenkmale,  i,  1883  ;  Manly,  Speci- 
mens, ii,  1897  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Dram.  Writings  of  Ed- 
wards, Norton,  Sackville,  1906. 

Discussion :  L.  H.  Courtney,  "  The  Tragedy  of  Ferrex  and  Por- 
rex,"  Notes  and  Queries,  2d  Series,  x  (1860),  261-263  ;  F.  Koch, 
"  Ferrex  and  Porrex,"  Halle,  1881;  E.  Koeppel,  "Beitrage 
zur  Geschichte  des  elizabethanischen  Dramas,"  Engl.  Stud., 
xvi  (1892),  357  f;  F.  Liebermann,  Herrig's  Archiv,  cvi  (1899)  ; 
H.  Schmidt,  "  Seneca's  Influence  upon  Gorboduc,"  Mod. 
Lang.  Notes,  ii  (1887),  56-70. 

HUGHES,  THOMAS,  and  others.  The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur. 
Published  in  an  octavo  pamphlet  entitled  "  Certaine  deuises 
and  shewes  presented  to  her  Maiestie  by  the  Gentlemen  of 
Grayes-Inne  at  her  Highnesse  Court  in  Greenewich,  the 
twenty-eighth  day  of  Februarie  in  the  thirtieth  yeare  of  her 
Maiesties  most  happy  Raigne,"  1587.  Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier, 
1828.  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  iv,  1874  ;  H.  C.  Grumbine,  Litterar- 
historische  Forschungen,  xiv,  1900.  Discussion :  J.  W.  Cunliffe, 
"Imitations  of  Seneca  in  The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur,"  Ap- 
pendix II  to  The  Influence  of  Seneca  on  Elizabethan  Tragedy, 
1893. 

B.    ITALIANATE  SENECAN  TRAGEDIES 

GASCOIGNE,  GEORGE,  and  KINWELMERSH,  FRANCIS.  Jocaata. 
"A  Tragedie  written  in  Greke  by  Euripides,  translated  and 
digested  into  Acte  by  George  Gascoygne,  and  Francis  Kin- 
welmershe  of  Grayes  Inne,  and  there  by  them  presented, 
1566."  (Really  translated  from  the  Italian  of  Dolce.)  MS. 
version  in  Brit.  Mus.  Printed  with  title  as  above  in  Gascoigue's 
"  Hundreth  sundrie  Flowres,"  1573.  Reprinted  in  "  The 
Posies  of  George  Gascoigne,"  1575  ;  Gascoigne's  Works,  1587; 
F.  J.  Child,  «  Four  Old  Plays,"  1848  ;  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  1869; 
J.  W.  Cuuliffe,  "  Supposes  and  Jocasta,"  Belles  Lettres  eoL, 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     225 

1906  ;  Works  of  Gascoigne,  i,  1907.  Discussion :  M.  T.  W. 
Ftirstcr,  "  Gascoigne's  Jocasta :  a  Translation  from  the  Italian," 
Mod.  Phil.,  i  (1903-O4),  146-150  ;  F.  E.  Schelling,  "Tliree 
Unique  Elizabethan  Dramas,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes  (1892);  in- 
corporated in  "The  Life  and  Writings  of  George  Gascoigne," 
1893. 

WILMOT,  ROBERT,  and  others,  Gismond  of  Salern.  Extant 
in  two  forms:  — 

(a)  Three  MS.  versions  giving  the  text  acted  at  the  Inner 
Temple  about  1567.  MS.  Lansdowne  78G:  reprinted  A. 
Brandl,  with  variant  readings  of  MS.  Hargrave  205, 
Quetten  u.  Forschungen,  1898. 

(6)  Revised  text  prepared  for  publication  by  Wilmot  twenty- 
four  years  after  the  original  performance.  Printed  as 
"The  Tragedie  of  Tancred  and  Gisnmnd.  Compiled 
by  the  Gentlemen  of  the  Inner  Temple,  and  by  them 
presented  before  her  Maiestie.  Newly  reuiued  and  pol- 
ished according  to  the  decorum  of  these  daies.  By  R. 
W."  1591.  Reissued  1592.  Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  edd. 
Discussion:  J.  W.  Cunliffe,  "Gismond  of  Salerne," 
Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  Ass.,  xxi  (1906),  435-461 ;  C.  Sher- 
wood, "  N.  E.  Bearbeitungen  der  Erzahlung  .  .  .  von 
Ghismonda  ..." 

C.    TRAGEDIES  OP  FRANCO-LATIN  INFLUENCE 

SIDNEY,  LADY  MARY,  Countess  of  Pembroke,  Antonius.  "  A 
Tragcedie  written  ...  in  French  by  Ro.  Gamier  .  .  .  done  in 
English,"  1592  (with  "A  Discourse  of  Life  and  Death"). 
Another  edition,  1595.  Reprinted,  Alice  H.  Luce,  Litterarhis- 
torische  Forschungen,  iii,  1897. 

K  v i',  THOMAS  :  Cornelia,  1594.  Re-issued,  1595,  with  ex- 
panded title  :  "  Pompey  the  Great,  his  faire  Cornelhes  Trage- 
die .  .  .  Written  in  French,  by  that  excellent  Poet  Ro  :  Gar- 
nier ;  and  translated  into  English  by  Thomas  Kid."  Reprinted, 
Dodsley,  all  edd.  ;  H.  Gassner,  1894. 

DANIEL,  SAMUEL.  Works,  ed.  A.  B.  Grosart,  5  vols.,  Huth  Li- 
brary, 1883-96.  Cleopatra.  Printed  in  "Delia  and  Rosa- 
mond augmented,"  1594  (2  edd.),  1595,  1598  ;  "The  Poet- 
icall  Essay es  of  Sam.  Danyel,"  1599  ;  "The  Works  of  Sam- 
uel Daniel,"  1601,  1602  ;  "  Certaiue  Small  Poems  Lately 


226  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Printed  :  with  the  Tragedie  of  Philotas.  Written  by  Samuel 
Daniel,"  1605  ;    "  Certain  Small    Workes    Heretofore    Di- 
vulged by    Samuel    Daniel,"    1607,    1611;    "The    Whole 
Workes  of  Samuel  Daniel  Esquire  in  Poetrie,"  1623  ;  re- 
printed as  "  Drainrnaticke  Poems,"  1635  ;  Materialien,  xrri. 
Philotas.  Printed  in  the  1605  edition  of  Daniel,  and  in  the 
later  edd.,  as  mentioned  above.  Separately  published, "  The 
Tragedie  of  Philotas.  By  Sam.  Daniel,"  1607. 
BRANDON,  SAMUEL,  "  The  Tragicomosdi  of  the  vertuous  Octa- 
via,"  1598.  Reprinted,  Malone  Society,  1910. 

D.    CLASSICIZING  TRAGEDIES  SHOWING  ORIGINAL  VARIATIONS  FROM 
THE  CONVENTIONAL  FORMS 

GREVILLE,  FXTLKE,  Alaham  and  Mustapha.  Both  included  in 
"  Certaine  Learned  and  Elegant  Workes  of  the  Right  Hon- 
orable Fulke  Lord  Brooke,  Written  in  his  Youth,"  1633. 
Reprinted,  A.  B.  Grosart,  Fuller  Worthies  Library,  1870.  "  The 
Tragedy  of  Mustapha"  was  printed  separately,  1609.  Dis- 
cussion: M.  W.  Croll,  "  The  Works  of  Fulke  Greville,"  1903. 

ALEXANDER,  WILLIAM,  Earl  of  Stirling.  Collected  editions: 
"The  Monarchick  Tragedies"  (Crcssus  and  Darius  only), 
1604  ;  "  The  Monarchicke  Tragedies  ;  Croesus,  Darius,  the 
Alezandreau,  Julius  Csesar,  Newly  enlarged,"  1607  ;  reprinted 
"  third  edition,"  1616  ;  "  Recreations  with  the  Muses,"  1637  ; 
"  Poetical  Works,"  3  vols.,  1870-72,  "  The  Tragedie  of  Da- 
rius "  published  separately,  1603.  Discussion :  H.  Beumelberg, 
"Sir  William  Alexander,  Graf  von  Stirling  ..."  1880. 
[With  this  group  are  related  Ben  Jonson's  Roman  tragedies  : 
Sejanus  his  Fall  (1605)  and  Catiline  his  Conspiracy 
(1611).  Jonson's  plays,  however,  are  not  properly  academic 
or  amateur.] 

HI.  POPULAR  TRAGEDIES  INFLUENCED  BY  CLASSIC  PRECEDENT 

Locrine.  "  Newly  set  f oorth,  ouerseene  and  corrected,  By  W.  S.w 
1595.  Reprinted  1734  (two  issues) ;  Malone  Society,  1908.  (For 
editions  of  this  play  in  the  third  and  fourth  Shakespeare  Fo~ 
lios  and  in  later  collections  of  accepted  or  supposititious  worirs 
of  Shakespeare,  see  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha,  1908,  442, 
443.) 

KYD,  THOMAS.  Works,  ed.  F.  S.  Boas,  1901.  General  Discussion : 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     227 

J.  Le  Gay  Brereton,  "  Notes  on  the  Text  of  Kydd,"  Engl. 
Stud.,  xxxvii  (1907),  87-99;  C.  Crawford,  "  A  Concordance  of 
the  Works  of  Kyd,"  Materialien,  xv,  1906;  K.  Markscheffel, 
"Thomas   Kyd's   Tragodien,"  1885;  G.  Sarrazin,  "Thomas 
Kyd  und  sein  Kreis,"  1892;  J.  Schick,  "Thomas  Kyd's  Todes- 
jahr,"  Sh.  Jb.  xxxv  (1899),  277-280  ;  O.  Michael,  "Der  Stil 
in  Thomas  Kyd's  Originaldramen,"  1905. 
The    Spanish   Tragedy.    Earliest  edition  extant  undated: 
"  Newly  corrected,  and  amended  of  such  grosse  faults  as 
passed  in  the  first  impression."    Reprinted  1594.  Ten  other 
editions  previous  to  the  end  of  1633  are  known.  (See  Greg's 
List.)  Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  edd. ;  T.  Hawkins,  "  Origin  of 
the  English  Drama,"  ii,  1773  ;  Ancient  British  Drama,  i, 
1810  ;  J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  ii,  1897;  J. Schick,  Temple 
Dramatists,  1898;  Litterarhistorische  Forschungen,jai  (1901). 
Discussion :  W.  Bang,  "  Kyd's  Spanish  Tragedy,"    Enyl. 
Stud.,  xxviii,  229-234;  G.  O.  Fleischer,  "  Bemerkung  en 
fiber  Kyds  Spanish  Tragedy,"  1896  ;  J.  A.  Worp,  "  Die 
Fabel  der  Spanish  Tragedy,"  Sh.  Jb.  xxix,  xxx  (1894)  ;  R. 
Schonwerth, "  Die  niederlandischen  .  .  .  Bearbeitungen  TOD 
Th.  Kyd's  Spanish  Tragedy,"  Lit.  Forschungen,  xxvi,  1903. 
Boliman  and  Feraeda.    Three  issues  of  1599  and  an  un- 
dated ed.  known.  Reprinted,  Th.  Hawkins,   Origin  of  the 
English  Drama,  ii,  1773;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  v.    Discussion: 
E.  Koeppel,  "  Beitrage  zur  geschichte  des  elizabethanischen 
dramas,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xvi  (1892);  G.  Sarrazin,  "Der  ver- 
fasser  von  Soli  man  and  Perseda,"  Engl.  Stud.,  XT  (1891), 
250-263.  [The  lost  Ur-Hamlet  of  ca.  1589  was  probably 
written  by  Kyd.  Cf.  J.  Allen,  "  The  Lost  Hamlet  of  Kyd," 
Westminster  Review,  1908  ;  J.  Corbin,  "  The  German  Hamlet 
and  Earlier  English  Versions,"  Harvard  Studies,  v,  1896 ; 
W.  Creizenach,  Mod.  Phil.,  ii  (1905);  W.  Creizenach,  *  Die 
vorahakespeare'sche  Hamlettragodie,"  Sh.  Jb.  xlii  (1906); 
J.  W.  Cunliffe,  "  Nash  and  the  Earlier  Hamlet,"  Publ.  Mod. 
Lang.  Ass.  (1906);  A.  S.  Jack,  Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  A»s.,  xx 
(1905);  M.  W.  MacCallum,  "  The  Authorship  of  the  Early 
Hamlet,"  Furnivall  Miscellany,  1901  (xrxi,  p.  282  ff);  K. 
Meier,  Dresdner  Anzeiger,  Mar.,  1904  ;  G.  Sarrazin,  "  Die 
Entstehung  der  Hamlet-Tragodie,"  Anglia,  xii,  xiii  (1890, 
1891);  C.  M.  Lewis,  "  The  Genesis  of  Hamlet,"  1907.] 


228  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

The  First  Part  of  Jeronimo.    "  With  the  Warres   of  For- 
tugall,  and  the  life  and  death  of  Don  Andrsea,"  1605.  Re- 
printed, Dodsley,  all   edd.  ;   Ancient  British  Drama,  i,  1810. 
Discussion:  J.  E.  Konth,  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xx  (1905). 
(This  play  has  been  ascribed,  doubtless  incorrectly,  to  Kyd.) 

MARLOWE,  CHRISTOPHER:  The  Jew  of  Malta,  1633.  Reprinted 
in  all  editions  of  Marlowe,  in  Reed's  and  Collier's  Dodsley, 
vol.  viii ;  W.  Oxberry,  1818  ;  A.  Wagner,  1889. 

Titus  Andronicus.  Written,  probably,  by  an  unidentified 
author,  and  retouched  by  Shakespeare.  Printed  1594,  1600 
(Facsimile  E.  W.  Ashbee,  1866,  C.  Prsetorius,  1886),  1611 
(Facsimile  E.  W.  Ashbee,  1867).  Reprinted  Shakespeare 
Folio,  1623  and  later  editions. 

Lust's  Dominion,  "  Or,  The  Lascivious  Queen.  A  Tragedie. 
Written  by  Christopher  Marlowe,  Gent.,"  1657.  Reprinted 

•    Robinson's  edition  of  Marlowe,  iii,  1826. 

Alphonsus,  Emperor  of  Germany.  "  By  George  Chapman 
Gent.,"  1654.  Reprinted,  K.  Elze,  1867;  T.  M.  Parrott,  "  The 
Tragedies  of  George  Chapman,"  1910. 

MARSTON,  JOHN  :  Antonio  and  Mellida.  Two  parts  :  "  The 
History  of  Antonio  and  Mellida.  The  first  part,"  "  Antonios 
Reuenge.  The  second  part."  Both  printed  1602.  Reprinted  in 
Marston's  Tragedies  and  Comedies,  1633  (two  issues)  ;  Works, 
ed.  Halliwell,  1856  ;  ed.  A.  B.  Grosart,  1879  ;  A.  H.  Bullen, 
1887. 

CHETTLE,  HENRY  :  Tragedy  of  Hoffman,  "  Or  A  Reuenge 
for  a  Father,"  1631.  Reprinted,  H.  B.  L(eonard),  1852  ; 
R.  Ackermann,  1894.  Discussion:  N.  Delias,  "Chettle's 
Hoffman  und  Shakspere's  Hamlet,"  Sh.  Jb.  iz  (1874), 
166-194. 

BARNES,  BARNABE  :  The  Devil's  Charter,  "  A  Tragaedie 
Conteining  the  Life  and  Death  of  Pope  Alexander  the  sixt, 
As  it  was  plaid  before  the  Kings  Maiestie,  Vpon  Candlemasse 
night  last  :  by  his  Maiesties  Seruants,"  1607.  Reprinted,  R. 
B.  McKerrow,  Materialien,  vi,  1904.  Discussion :  A.  E.  H. 
Swaen  and  G.  B.  Moore  Smith,  "Notes  on  the  Devil's 
Charter,"  Mod.  Lang.  Review,  i  (1906),  122  ff. 

TOTJRNEUR,  CYRIL  :  The  Atheist's  Tragedy,  "  Or  The  honest 
Man's  Reuenge,"  1611,  1612.  The  Revenger's  Tragedy, 
1607,  1608.  Both  reprinted  in  Tourueur's  Works,  ed.  J.  C. 


CLASSICAL  INFLUENCE  IN  TRAGEDY     229 

Collins,  1878 ;  Mermaid  edition  of  Webster  and  Tourneur, 
J.  A.  Symonds,  1888. 

CHAPMAN,  GEORGE  :  Bossy  D' Ambois,  1607.  Five  other  issues 
before  the  end  of  1657.  The  Revenge  of  Bussy  D' Ambois, 
1613.  Both  reprinted  in  editions  of  Chapman's  Works; 
W.  L.  Phelps,  Mermaid  ed. ;  T.  M.  Parrott,  Tragedies  of 
Chapman,  1910. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE   HEROIC   PLAY 

IT  is  necessary  to  look  far  into  the  past  in  order  to 
trace  the  ultimate  source  of  the  dramatic  current 
which  during  the  last  fifteen  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign 
blended  with  the  influences  already  considered,  and 
preserved  tragedy  from  barren  sensationalism  by 
teaching  it  the  value  of  the  individual  personality. 
Coeval  with  the  beginnings  and  earliest  development 
of  the  regular  stage  under  religious  auspices,  there  had 
existed  an  entirely  popular  species  of  quasi-dramatic 
entertainment,  much  less  definite  in  form  and  less  rich 
in  evolutionary  possibilities,  but  even  more  firmly  in- 
grained in  the  life  of  the  nation,  and  deep  rooted  in 
hoariest  antiquity.  This  incipient  communal  drama 
found  expression  through  such  questionable  media  as 
the  village  dance,  the  choral  song,  and  the  ballad,  but 
retained  its  dramatic  germ  tenaciously  from  the  pagan 
sword  dance  to  the  latest  degenerate  survivals  in 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  century  hamlets.  Most 
commonly  it  dealt  with  the  celebration  of  heroic  qual- 
ities and  lauded  individual  prowess,  sometimes  that 
of  mythical  warrior -deities,  sometimes  of  historical 
or  semi-historical  characters  like  Percy  and  Douglas, 
Robin  Hood  or  Sir  Gawain. 

The  fifteenth  century,  the  period  of  the  highest 
development  and  broadest  diffusion  of  the  religious 
drama,  evolved  concurrently,  as  its  other  most  char- 
acteristic literary  product,  the  great  volume  of  ballad 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  231 

poetry,  which  treated,  for  the  most  part,  the  popular 
figures  of  legend  or  romuucc  in  a  form  always  verging 
upon  the  dramatic.  Certain  extant  fragments  of  the 
time  even  show  the  particular  ballad  hero,  Robin  Hood, 
to  have  been  the  subject  of  real  plays  which  depicted 
his  character  and  feats  in  a  manner  identical  at  all 
points  with  that  of  the  ballads.1  All  this  literature 
implies  the  existence  among  the  common  people  of 
England  at  the  beginning  of  the  Tudor  period  of  a 
strong  interest  in  the  crudest  form  of  character  por- 
trayal; that  is,  in  the  delineation  of  a  well-known  figure 
in  the  performance  of  deeds  too  simple  and  familiar 
to  distract  the  attention  by  reason  of  either  novelty 
or  intricate  plot  manipulation.  This  interest  contin- 
ued unabated  among  the  vulgar,  in  spite  of  the  gibes 
and  attacks  of  more  progressive  critics,  till  after  the 
reign  of  James  I ;  and  its  vitality  is  attested,  not  only 
by  the  numerous  hostile  allusions,  but  by  the  stupen- 
dous output  of  low-priced  chapbooks  and  ballads 
recording  the  adventures  of  popular  figures  like  Guy 
of  Warwick,  Valentine  and  Orson,  and  the  Arthurian 
heroes. 

The  general  craving  thus  indicated  was  mainly 
satisfied  during  the  ascendancy  of  the  religious  play 
and  the  interlude  by  means  of  verse  and  prose  narra- 
tive rather  than  the  drama;  but  it  was  largely  a  dra- 
matic instinct,  and  in  the  end  it  affected  the  stage 
both  for  good  and  ill.  Undoubtedly,  it  was  this  taste, 
implanted  in  the  body  of  the  people,  which  kept  alive 
the  desire  for  serious  popular  drama  during  the  long 

1  Two  such  works  are  reprinted  in  Manly  s  Specimens  of  the  Pre- 
Shakupcrcan  Drama,  vol.  i,  279  ff,  and  in  the  Malone  Society 
"Collections,"  part  ii  (1908),  117  ff. 


232  .  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

reign  of  almost  unmixed  farce,  and  it  was  the  same 
taste  which  refused  to  be  satisfied  with  the  imported 
Senecan  tragedy  of  plot  intrigue  alone,  and  restricted 
Senecan  imitation  for  some  thirty  years  to  the  learned 
amateur  stage.  On  the  one  hand,  this  state  of  literary 
interest  did  much  to  raise  Elizabethan  drama  supe- 
rior to  the  petty  cult  of  novelty  and  to  give  it  one  of 
its  clearest  lines  of  contact  with  Athenian  tragedy  in 
its  sane  presentation  of  great  characters  and  events, 
untrammelled  by  the  shame  of  plagiarism  or  triteness. 
The  same  influence  operated  disadvantageously,  how- 
ever, in  encouraging  a  very  cavalier  attitude  among 
the  popular  dramatists  towards  the  virtues  of  unity 
and  formal  regularity  in  plot  construction.  It  gave  an 
epic  tinge  to  much  of  the  drama  of  the  day,  impelling 
the  writers  to  cut  their  material  lineally  rather  than 
transversely,  and  thus  substitute  for  the  full  and  bal- 
anced treatment  of  the  story's  climax  a  rambling  epi- 
sodic chronicle  of  incidents.  It  tended  normally  to 
promote  the  glorification  of  the  central  figure  and  the 
neglect  of  all  others. 

The  general  appetite  for  narratives  of  popular 
heroes,  to  which  the  ballads  of  the  fifteenth  century 
largely  ministered,  was  further  fed  at  the  close  of  that 
period  by  adapting  to  the  vulgar  taste  the  romance 
of  chivalry,  once  an  essentially  aristocratic  species  of 
literature,  now  fallen  somewhat  into  disrepute.  The 
great  period  of  chivalrous  romance  came  to  a  long 
deferred  end  with  Malory,  who  summed  up  in  prose 
what  had  centuries  before  been  written  in  verse  and 
said  what  should  perhaps  have  been  the  last  word  upon 
the  Arthurian  story.  The  success  of  the  "Morte 
d' Arthur,"  however,  called  forth  numerous  imitations, 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  233 

and  gave  renewed  life  among  the  populace  to  a  liter- 
ary genre  which  as  a  courtly  type  had  long  arrived  at 
senility.  Among  the  host  of  works  thus  recalled  into 
vogue,  two  deserve  particular  notice:  "Huon  of  Bor- 
deaux," rendered  from  the  French  by  Lord  Berners, 
the  translator  of  Froissart,  during  the  reign  of  Henry 
VIII,  and  the  enormously  famous  "Amadis  of  Gaul," 
of  which  one  Elizabethan  version  is  the  work  of  the 
dramatist  Anthony  Munday.1 

This  kind  of  fiction  maintained  itself  by  no  fresh- 
ness or  skill  in  narrative,  but  merely  by  the  portrayal 
in  crude  outline  of  some  stupendous  central  figure. 
In  the  appreciation  of  critics  whose  taste  was  being 
chastened  alike  by  the  ideals  of  classical  restraint  and 
by  Puritan  morality,  such  vulgar  stories  steadily  lost 
caste,  till  they  came  to  be  regarded  as  emblematic  of 
all  that  was  low  and  inartistic  in  literature.2  Yet  we 
have  overwhelming  evidence,  not  only  for  the  undi- 
minishing  appeal  of  this  style  of  narrative  with  the 
rude  public  to  which  it  mainly  catered,  but  also  for 
the  important  fact  that  the  rough  dramatizations  of 
such  hero-stories  formed  during  two  thirds  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign  the  chief  source  of  popular  serious  drama. 
In  a  well-known  passage  of  his  "Schoolmaster," 
Roger  Ascham  records  his  hostility  to  the  type  of 
fiction  represented  by  the  "Morte  d' Arthur"  and  the 
ballads  as  well  as  to  the  newer  vogue  of  the  Italian 
novel.  The  judgment  of  Gosson  and  Meres,  both 

1  An  earlier  translation  by  T.  Paynell  bad  appeared  in  1567. 

1  Note,  for  example,  Ben  Jonson's  hit  at  "The  Knight  of 
tin-  Sun"  in  Cynthia  a  Revels  (III,  iii),  and  at  the  "Arcadia"  in 
Bartholomew  Fair  (IV,  ii)  and  Every  Man  Out  of  his  Humor 
(II,  >). 


234  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

classicists  and  Puritans,  is  to  the  same  effect,  and 
bears  the  same  witness  to  the  strength  of  the  repro- 
bated fashion.  Writing  in  1579,  Gosson  declares:  "I 
may  boldly  say  it  because  I  have  seen  it,  that  'The 
Palace  of  Pleasure,'  'The  Golden  Ass/  'The  Ethio- 
pian History,'  'Amadis  of  France,'  and  'The  Round 
Table '  .  .  .  have  been  thoroughly  raked  to  furnish  the 
playhouses  in  London." 

And  Francis  Meres,  with  equal  emphasis  on  the 
moral  side  of  the  question,  gives  a  catalogue  of  titles 
of  the  offending  literature  comparing  interestingly 
with  the  great  collection  of  similar  works  which  the 
bourgeois  Captain  Cox  of  Coventry  is  known  to  have 
made.  Meres  writes  in  a  section  of  his  "Palladis 
Tamia"  (1598)  dealing  with  the  "Reading  of  bookes": 
"As  the  Lord  de  la  Nonne  in  the  sixe  discourse  of  his 
politike  and  military  discourses  censureth  of  the  bookes 
of  'Amadis  de  Gaule,'  wh.  he  saith  are  no  lesse  hurt- 
full  to  youth  then  the  workes  of  Michiauell  to  age:  so 
these  bookes  are  accordingly  to  be  censured  of,  whose 
names  follow:  'Beuis  of  Hampton,'  'Guy  of  War- 
wicke,'  'Arthur  of  the  Round  Table,'  'Huon  of  Bor- 
deaux, '  '  Oliuer  of  the  Castle,'  '  The  Foure  Sonnes  of 
Aymon,' '  Gargantua,' '  Gireleon,' '  The  Honour  of  Chiu- 
alrie,'  'Primaleon  of  Greece,'  'Palmerin  de  Oliua,'  'The 
7.  Champions,'  'The  Myrror  of  Knighthood,'  'Blanch- 
erdine,' '  Meruin '  [Merlin  ?], '  Howleglasse '  [Till  Eulen- 
spiegel],  the  stories  of  'Palladyne'  and  'Palmendos,' 
'The  Blacke  Knight,'  'The  Maiden  Knight,'  'The 
History  of  Cselestina,'  '  The  Castle  of  Fame,'  'Gallian 
of  France,'  'Ornatus  and  Artesia,'  etc." 

In  his  list  of  sources  of  contemporary  popular  drama 
quoted  above,  Gosson  adds  to  the  typical  cycles  of  the 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  235 

Round  Table  and  Amadis  and  the  not  altogether  dis- 
similar sentimental  romance  of  the  late  Greek  Helio- 
dorus  the  collections  of  stories,  often  unedifying,  in 
Apuleius's  "Golden  Ass,"  and  Painter's  "Palace  of 
Pleasure."  It  was  works  like  the  first  three  of  these 
which  lent  to  Elizabethan  drama  many  of  the  features 
to  be  considered  in  this  chapter.  The  great  bulk  of 
English  popular  drama,  prior  to  1587,  which  was  not 
farce,  seems  to  have  belonged  to  this  pseudo-chivalrous 
convention;  and  the  playwrights  dealt  the  more  freely 
with  their  material  by  reason  of  the  decadence  of  the 
heroic  romance  as  an  art  form.  It  would,  of  course, 
be  absurd  to  suppose  that  the  drama  could  learn  any 
truth  of  human  character  from  the  ridiculous  figures 
that  strut  through  the  vulgarized  romances  of  the  day. 
Yet  this  weak  and  dying  species  left  to  the  plays  formed 
out  of  it  certain  conventional  types  of  personality, 
infinitely  rude  and  coarse,  which  were  freely  incor- 
porated and  gave  the  resultant  dramas  their  chief 
interest.  They  were  little  more  than  lay  figures;  but 
they  held  the  eyes  of  the  audiences,  carried  on  the 
action,  and  declaimed  the  tremendous  speeches,  giv- 
ing dramatists  and  people  their  first  glimpse  of  tragic 
character,  and  creating  the  conditions  which  later 
made  it  possible  for  Marlowe  to  replace  them  by 
figures  of  flesh  and  blood.  "Tamburlaine"  is  the  clas- 
sic instance  of  chivalrous  romance  turned  drama,  or 
rather  "Tamburlaine"  would  be  if  we  could  detach 
its  constituent  machinery  from  the  web  of  lyric  passion 
in  which  the  poet  has  enshrouded  it.  What  Seneca  was 
to  Kyd,  the  heritage  of  romantic  legend  may  be  said 
to  have  been  to  Marlowe;  and  it  chanced  by  the  bless- 
ing of  fate  that  each  of  these  masters  forged  simul- 


236  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

taneously  from  his  little-promising  material  one  of  the 
two  indispensables  of  tragedy:  plot  and  character. 

The  vast  majority  of  the  plays  roughly  manufac- 
tured out  of  tales  of  knightly  adventure  during  the 
first  thirty  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign  have  certainly 
perished.  Frankly  artless  as  they  were  in  form  and 
ephemeral  in  purpose,  it  is  surprising  that  any  should 
have  found  their  way  into  print,  and  the  few  that  do 
survive  doubtless  owe  that  distinction  to  a  degree  of 
sophistication  unusual  to  the  general  type. 

The  fairest  example  of  the  species  is  a  work  entitled 
"The  Historic  of  the  two  valiant  Knights,  Syr  Clyo- 
mon  Knight  of  the  Golden  Sheeld,  sonne  to  the  King 
of  Denmarke:  And  Clamydes  the  white  Knight,  sonne 
to  the  King  of  Suavia."  This  anonymous  production, 
published  in  1599,  but  probably  a  score  of  years  older, 
was  formerly  ascribed  very  unreasonably  to  George 
Peele,  and  has  been  lately  attributed  on  purely  specu- 
lative grounds  to  Thomas  Preston,  the  author  of  "  Cam- 
bises." l  Here,  through  the  tedious  length  of  one  hundred 
and  forty  pages  of  hobbling  rime,  are  presented,  with  the 
intricate  formlessness  characteristic  of  the  later  prose 
romance,  the  adventures  of  the  two  titular  heroes  in 
pursuit  of  love  and  honor.  Their  wanderings  bear 
them  through  a  strange  world,  ruled  in  chief  by  no  less 
a  monarch  than  King  Alexander  the  Great,  —  a  world 
which  includes  besides  numerous  widely  distant  realms 
an  Isle  of  Strange  Marshes  and  a  Forest  of  Strange 
Marvels.  In  addition  to  the  more  usual  actors  of 
heroic  romance,  the  reader  meets  a  flying  serpent  that 
feeds  on  ladies  fair;  a  crafty  enchanter,  Brian  Sans- 

1  See  G.  L.  Kittredge,  "Notes  on  Elizabethan  Plays,"  Journal  of 
Germanic  Philology,  ii,  7  S. 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  237 

foy,  who  imprisons  good  knights  in  his  tower  and 
seeks  by  true  fairy-tale  methods  to  beguile  Sir  Clamy- 
des  of  his  love;  and  an  oppressed  princess  wandering 
in  page's  attire.  Only  in  the  vice,  Subtle  Shift,  who 
plays  the  part  of  squire  to  each  of  the  knights  in  turn; 
in  the  humorous  dialect  of  the  old  countryman,  Corin; 
and  perhaps  in  the  descent  of  Providence  in  propria 
persona  to  prevent  the  heroine's  suicide,  is  there  any 
touch  of  ordinary  dramatic  convention. 

Analogous  in  content  and  structure  is  another  play 
of  approximately  the  same  date  (ca.  1576):  "An  Ex- 
cellent and  Pleasant  Comedie,  termed  after  the  name 
of  the  Vice,  Common  Conditions,  drawne  out  of  the 
most  famous  historic  of  Galiarbus  Duke  of  Arabia,  and 
of  the  good  and  eeuill  successe  of  him  and  his  two  chil- 
dren, Sedmond  his  sun  and  Clarisia  his  daughter." 
The  general  form  and  predominant  seven-foot  couplet 
of  "Clyomon  and  Clamides"  appear  equally  in  "Com- 
mon Conditions,"  which,  however,  surpasses  the  other 
drama  in  its  employment  of  conventional  comic  ma- 
terial, and  shows  in  general  a  somewhat  less  total 
ignorance  of  the  laws  of  theatrical  composition.  The 
adventures  of  the  hero  and  heroine,  seeking  their 
exiled  father  through  the  wide  world,  are  complicated 
by  the  persecutions  of  a  marauding  band  of  tinkers  on 
land  and  a  pirate  crew  by  sea;  but  most  of  all  by  the 
petty  knaveries  of  their  page,  Common  Conditions, 
who  creates  much  of  the  action  by  extricating  the 
main  characters  from  certain  difficulties  to  plunge 
them  mischievously  into  others.  Like  the  usual  vice 
of  the  interlude,  and  like  his  less  developed  counter- 
part, Subtle  Shift  in  "Clyomon  and  Clamides,"  Com- 
mon Conditions  makes  use  of  an  alias,  calling  himself 


238  THE   ttJDOR  DRAMA 

upon  occasion  Master  Affection;  and  when  convicted 
of  this  deceit,  he  explains  with  some  glibness  that 
Affection  is  his  "sure  name,"  but  Conditions  his  "kir- 
sonname."  Abundant  love  interest  is  presented  in  the 
style  popular  with  the  readers  of  chivalrous  romance. 
The  heroine,  married  after  a  courtship  more  sensa- 
tional than  convincing,  to  the  knight  Lamphedon, 
suffers  exile,  captivity  at  the  hands  of  pirates,  separa- 
tion from  her  husband,  and  a  long  sojourn  in  a  foreign 
land,  where  as  the  Lady  Metrsea  she  withstands  hap- 
pily the  embarrassment  of  courtship  by  her  own  bro- 
ther, likewise  disguised,  and  by  the  lord  of  the  coun- 
try. Meantime,  Lamphedon,  roaming  over  the  world 
in  search  of  the  lost  Clarisia,  vanquishes  pirate  crews 
single-handed,  and  subdues  in  battle  a  notable  im-^ 
prisoner  of  ladies,  Cardolus,  the  lord  of  Marofus  Isle. 
The  wearisome  complexity  of  "Clyomon  and  Clam- 
ides"  and  "Common  Conditions"  does  much  to  ob- 
scure the  crude  character  interest  which  appears  in 
the  early  Robin  Hood  fragments,  and  which  practi- 
cally alone  kept  alive  this  kind  of  drama.  Like  the 
debased  romances  which  inspired  them,  these  plays 
sacrifice  to  the  illegitimate  ambition  of  heaping  up 
surprises  and  sensations  the  one  great  merit  of  their 
type,  —  the  power  to  paint  in  rough  but  striking  out- 
line a  few  elemental  passions  and  experiences.  The 
average  early  Elizabethan  heroic  play  can  hardly  have 
possessed  the  confusing  intricacy  of  character  and 
situation  found  in  the  two  overlabored  specimens 
which  the  printers  not  unnaturally  chose  for  publica- 
tion. Yet  even  in  these  examples  it  is  clear  that  the 
interest  of  spectators  depended  upon  character  rather  • 
than  plot;  that  is,  amid  all  the  profusion  of  incident 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  239 

the  attention  was  not  fixed  on  the  answer  to  a  problem 
of  intrigue,  but  followed  in  dull  wonder  each  of  tjie 
main  figures  as  each  passed  through  a  series  of  discon- 
nected adventures. 

In  the  way  of  real  character  these  works  had  nat- 
urally little,  if  anything,  to  offer;  and  they  must  of 
necessity  be  supplanted  as  soon  as  mature  tragedy 
began  to  hold  up  a  mirror  to  actual  life.  Through  a 
time  of  perilous  uncertainty,  however,  they  performed 
for  the  English  theatre  two  great  services,  in  maintain- 
ing serious  story  on  a  popular  stage  otherwise  given 
over  to  farce,  and  in  fixing  the  attention  upon  the 
individual  dramatic  personage.  It  is  important  to 
observe  that  in  the  plays  under  discussion  comedy  by 
no  means  chokes  interest  in  the  serious  plot  as  it  does 
in  contemporary  works  of  another  style,  like  "Cam- 
bises"  and  "Damon  and  Pithias."  In  bustle  and  hu- 
man appeal  the  figures  of  knights  and  ladies  more  than 
equal  those  of  vice  or  clown,  and  the  latter  character, 
a  survival  from  the  interlude  convention,  is  no  longer 
an  independent  attraction,  but  takes  an  active  part  in 
the  elaboration  of  the  general  plot.  In  such  plays 
we  find  serious  English  drama  making  its  first  stand 
during  the  Tudor  period  against  the  otherwise  over- 
whelming vogue  of  farce  and  buffoonery. 

So,  again,  though  the  early  chivalrous  drama  could 
not  make  its  figures  humanly  convincing  or  psycho- 
logically true,  it  could  make  them  interesting  to  the 
vulgar  playgoer;  and  that  was  probably  the  most  in- 
dispensable need  of  the  moment.  It  kept  the  eyes  of 
the  spectators  constantly  fixed  upon  its  rude  men  of 
straw,  and  these  were  in  good  time  replaced  by  living 
figures.  In  this  life-giving  metamorphosis  Marlowe 


240  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

was  the  chief  engineer;  but  before  it  could  occur  there 
was  required  a  new  and  saner  view  of  dramatic  art. 
The  advance  in  structure,  which  evidences  the  birth 
of  the  new  art,  came  out  of  Seneca,  when  Seneca  had 
at  last  been  brought  into  harmony  with  the  spirit  of 
the  age.  Yet  without  the  succession  of  crude  heroic 
plays,  it  is  doubtful  whether  Thomas  Kyd  would  have 
found  a  public  for  his  thaumaturgic  "Spanish  Trag- 
edy." And  if  the  public  had  not  been  there  craving 
a  drama  that  should  deal  with  emotions  deeper  than 
the  horse-play  and  mummery  of  the  interlude,  it  is  well- 
nigh  certain  that  Kyd  would  never  have  condescended 
to  nationalize  classic  art.  Instead  of  "The  Spanish 
Tragedy"  and  "Soliman  and  Perseda,"  he  might  well 
have  produced  a  mere  series  of  "Cornelias." 

At  the  same  time,  probably  in  the  very  year  (1587), 
in  which  Kyd  settled  the  place  of  classic  influence  in 
the  development  of  English  tragedy,  Marlowe  took 
up  the  play  of  chivalry.  He  idealized  it  in  "Tambur- 
laine,"  and  gave  it  a  poetic  intensity  so  far  in  excess  of 
anything  it  had  previously  known,  that  the  contrast 
killed  then  and  forever  the  original  species.  "Hens- 
lowe's  Diary,"  indeed,  gives  evidence  of  the  attempt 
of  that  illiterate  manager  to  entertain  his  audiences 
during  the  decade  beginning  1592  with  plays  presum- 
ably after  the  archaic  pattern;  plays  presenting  such 
heroes  as  Huon  of  Bordeaux,  Godfrey  of  Boulogne, 
Chinon  of  England,  King  Arthur,  Valentine  and 
Orson,  Randal,  Earl  of  Chester,  and  the  four  sons  of 
Aymon.1  The  total  disappearance  of  all  these  works 
argues  sufficiently  the  contempt  they  received  from  a 
public  that  had  outgrown  them.  The  few  surviving 
1  See  Henslowe's  Diary,  ed.  W.  W.  Greg. 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  241 

chivalrous  plays  of  this  period,  which  are  not  obvious 
derivatives  from  Marlowe,  seem  to  have  been  written 
mostly  for  distinctly  plebeian  audiences,  and  in  every 
case  they  blend  the  heroic  strain  with  material  of 
another  kind.  Weak  medleys  like  "George-a-Greene," 
"Mucedorus,"  and  "Fair  Em"  illustrate  the  last  state 
of  the  undeveloped  heroic  play.1 

Thomas  Heywood's  "Four  Prentices  of  London," 
which  the  apologetic  preface  to  the  edition  of  1615 
asserts  to  have  been  in  fashion  "some  fifteen  or  sixteen 
years  ago,"  can  certainly  have  laid  claim  at  the  period 
indicated  to  only  a  very  vulgar  and  inartistic  public. 
Ineffectual  imitation  of  "Tamburlaine"  is  apparent 
in  the  valiant  quarrelsomeness  and  Thrasonical  mil- 
itary ardor  of  the  heroes,  of  whom  no  fewer  than  six 
compete  for  the  spectator's  main  attention.  But  the 
utter  formlessness  of  the  piece,  which  shows  not  even 
the  most  glimmering  realization  of  the  possibilities 
of  scene  division  or  the  need  of  plot  coherence,  —  to- 
gether with  the  rank  absurdity  of  the  fable, — proves 
that  it  belongs  in  spirit  to  the  pre-" Tamburlaine" 
epoch.  The  special  appeal  to  the  London  apprentices, 
supported  by  the  most  ridiculous  distortion  of  the 
story,  adds  concrete  evidence  for  the  natural  assump- 
tion that  this  play,  like  the  lost  dramas  of  Henslowe's 
Company,  was  consciously  produced  in  a  cheap  and 
obsolete  style  for  the  satisfaction  of  the  most  vulgar 
taste. 

The  attitude  of  progressive  and  educated  opinion 

1  In  each  of  these  plays  the  heroical  element  appears  to  form  the 
groundwork  of  the  plot;  but  in  each  case  this  fundamental  material 
is  neglected  or  distorted  in  the  development  of  the  kind  of  interest 
proper  to  the  more  fashionable  romantic  comedy. 


242  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

toward  the  old  play  of  chivalrous  romance  during  the 
last  ten  years  of  the  sixteenth  century  is  expressed  in 
the  exquisite  satire  of  the  type  in  Peele's  "Old  Wives'  v 
Tale";  while  in  Beaumont's  later  "Knight  of  the 
Burning  Pestle"  (1609  ?)  — supposed  to  be  directed  in 
particular  against  "The  Four  Prentices  of  London"  — 
the  ridicule  is  yet  sharper,  and  the  restriction  of  the 
offending  species  to  the  bourgeois  public  is  clearly 
emphasized.  The  Induction  to  Beaumont's  play  con- 
tains a  very  complete  list  of  the  favorite  dramatic  - 
entertainments  of  the  contemporary  London  rabble. 
In  "The  Four  Prentices  of  London"  there  remains 
hardly  anything  of  the  stress  upon  the  individual  figure 
which  gave  the  heroic  drama  its  original  significance. 
Still  less  of  the  old  character  appears  in  two  other  late 
members  of  the  species  which  owe  nothing  to  the  ex- 
ample of  Marlowe.  One  of  these  plays,  first  printed 
from  a  British  Museum  manuscript  in  1884  by  Mr. 
Bullen,  under  the  title  of  "The  Distracted  Emperor" 
deals  in  excessively  sensational  fashion  with  a  morbid 
perversion  of  the  story  of  Charlemagne,  Orlando,  and 
Ganelon.  The  other  —  entitled  "The  History  of  the 
Trial  of  Chivalry,"  and  published  in  1605  as  lately 
acted  by  the  Earl  of  Derby's  Company — is  an  elabo- 
rate composite  of  knightly  and  romantic  adventure 
constructed  about  an  apocryphal  theme  of  rivalry  be- 
tween Lewis  King  of  France  and  the  King  of  Navarre. 
In  such  works  heroic  drama  reaches  an  ebb  as  low  as 
that  to  which  heroic  romance  had  been  brought  in  its 
most  decadent  popularized  representations.  The  in- 
dividual figure  loses  every  charm,  and  the  consequent 
impoverishment  in  human  interest  is  meanly  compen- 
sated by  the  multiplication  of  unimpressive  stock 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  243 

characters  and  the  interpolation  of  extraneous  plot 
devices.1 

Christopher  Marlowe  brought  to  the  composition  of 
"Tamburlaine"  (1587-1588)  the  full  classical  training 
of  a  Cambridge  Master  of  Arts,  and  not  improbably 
also  the  experience  derived  from  the  previous  dramatiza- 
tion of  the  Latin  story  of  Dido.  This  preparation  lent 
to  his  essay  at  chivalrous  drama  a  certain  invaluable 
sense  of  form,  which  shows  itself,  for  example,  in  the 
poet's  ordering  his  material  in  acts  and  scenes;  and  a 
Vergilian  delicacy  of  finish  which  made  the  blank  verse 
of  "Tamburlaine"  illumine  the  dark  ways  of  dramatic 
style  with  veritable  light  from  above.  In  the  essentials, 
however,  of  plot  and  character,  Marlowe  followed  na- 
tive usage  alone.  Of  tragedy  in  the  proper  sense  the 
heroic  drama  had  no  idea;  nor  did  either  part  of  "Tam- 
burlaine" show  any  clear  conception  of  that  wise 
economy  of  tragic  material  which  rejects  all  irrelevant 
horrors  and  so  manages  the  rest  as  to  heighten  the 
climactic  interest  of  the  close.  There  is  here  no  cul- 
mination of  suspense  as  the  play  approaches  the  inevi- 
table solution  of  a  great  central  problem.  Rather,  we  ^ 
follow  the  progress  of  the  mighty  conqueror  through  a 
succession  of  breathless  glories,  till  arbitrarily  the  ex- 
citement drops,  and  the  play  ends  on  the  lowered  key  of 
peaceful  marriage  or  triumphant  death. 

Like  the  compilers  of  the  romances  of  "Amadis** 
and  "Sir  Huon,"  Marlowe  starts  with  the  purpose  of 

1  Plays  of  this  type  doubtless  stimulated  the  taste  for  purposeless 
martial  scenes  like  those  in  All  '*  Well  that  Ends  Well.  A  good  illus- 
tration is  The  Weakest  Coeth  to  the  Wall,  which,  though  not  a  heroic 
play,  resembles  The  Trial  of  Chivalry  in  its  presentation  of  fictitious 
French  history. 


244  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

displaying  the  grandeur  of  his  hero  through  a  sequence 
of  independent  adventures;  and  having  commenced 
near  the  point  of  incredibility,  flags  his  invention  in  the 
effort  to  cap  each  past  marvel  by  the  next.  The  violent 
crudities  of  both  parts  of  "Tamburlaine,"  in  speech 
and  action,  arise  not  so  much  from  inherent  want  of 
taste,  as  from  the  desperate  need  of  maintaining  the 
naturally  lessening  interest  of  the  piece.  The  enforced 
self-murder  of  Agidas;  the  vulgarity  of  the  word  combat 
between  Zenocrate  and  Zabina;  and  the  shocking  bar- 
barity of  the  scenes  which  depict  the  imprisonment 
of  Bajazet  and  his  contributory  kings,  and  the  cold- 
blooded slaughter  of  the  virgins  of  Damascus,  the  gov- 
ernor of  Babylon,  and  Tamburlaine's  own  son  are  all 
blemishes  produced  by  the  attempt  to  make  effective 
on  the  stage  an  essentially  narrative  presentation  of  * 
the  triumphant  warrior.  In  the  general  atmosphere  of 
the  scenes,  the  romantic  picture  of  the  relations  be- 
tween Tamburlaine  and  Zenocrate,  and  the  conception 
of  the  various  subsidiary  kings  and  governors,  Mar- 
lowe follows  the  conventional  usage  of  chivalrous  ro- 
mance; and  in  making  the  great  central  figure  common 
to  all  such  literature  at  the  same  time  the  exponent  of 
his  own  personal  rage  for  ideal  grandeur,  he  created  the 
first  great  psychological  character  in  English  tragedy 
and  exorcised  a  fervent  living  spirit  to  inform  the  pro- 
mising dramatic  frame  which  the  English  Senecans  had 
devised.  Tragic  drama  in  England  was  consummated 
in  the  blending  of  classical  and  native  influences,  in  the 
union  of  form  and  spirit.  It  is  probably  no  chance  phe- 
nomenon that  "Hamlet,"  the  most  typical  of  English 
tragedies,  is  the  one  in  which  we  can  see  most  clearly 
how  the  rich  plot  outline  of  the  "  tragedy  of  blood  "  has 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  245 

been  overlaid  and  spiritualized  by  that  deep  study  of  a 
human  soul  first  attempted  in  the  plays  of  Marlowe. 

In  the  study  of  the  two  parts  of  "Tamburlaine,"  the 
critic's  interest  in  actual  achievement  transcends  for 
the  first  time  that  suggested  by  evolutionary  poten- 
tialities. Crude  as  these  plays  are  on  the  side  of  form, 
they  yet  embody  certain  stable  peculiarities  in  their 
relation  to  life  and  art  which  we  are  accustomed  to  re- 
gard as  special  characteristics  of  the  best  Elizabethan 
drama.  They  mark  the  approach  to  the  great  dramatic 
watershed  which  separates  early  Elizabethan  crudity 
from  Jacobean  and  Caroline  sterility.  To  be  sure,  the 
individual  heights  stand  far  above  them  in  the  master- 
pieces of  Shakespeare  and  Jonson,  but  the  continued 
rise  of  the  general  dramatic  level  can  no  longer  be 
safely  presupposed. 

The  wide-spread  imitation  of  the  "Tamburlaine" 
plays  was  inevitable.  They  implanted  the  great  de- 
sideratum of  theatrical  success  —  striking  psychologic 
effect  —  in  a  type  of  literature  long  beloved  not  only 
on  the  popular  stage,  but  also  in  the  narrative  fiction 
of  the  time.  That  nearly  all  these  imitations  proved 
total  failures  was  perfectly  natural.  "Tamburlaine" 
was  even  less  susceptible  of  uninspired  copying  than 
"The  Spanish  Tragedy";  to  an  even  greater  extent 
were  its  excesses  of  speech  and  action  part  of  its  very 
nature.  The  bombast  and  violence  of  Marlowe's  play 
were  transmuted  into  legitimate  dramatic  material  by 
the  fervency  with  which  the  poet  expressed  his  own  high  fc 
aspiring  soul  in  the  terms  of  world-conquest  and  war- 
like ruthlessness.  Reproduced  by  any  less  translunary 
pen,  these  extravagances  showed  themselves  for  the 
intrinsic  rubbish  that  they  were;  pruned  away,  they  left 


246  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

not  even  the  plot  outline  upon  which  the  pedestrian 
imitators  of  Kyd  were  able  to  rest  their  helplessness. 

In  the  "Comicall  Historic  of  Alphonsus,  King  of 
Arragon,"  Robert  Greene,  one  of  the  most  active  pro- 
moters of  dramatic  innovation,  has  attempted  with 
disastrous  result  to  emulate  the  success  of  "Tambur- 
laine."  Diction,  character,  and  incident  are  reproduced 
brazenly  in  a  medley  of  the  most  perfect  insipidity. 
Apparently  conscious  of  his  inability  to  hold  the  atten- 
tion by  the  mere  slavish  following  of  Marlowe's  exam- 
ple, Greene  has  added  several  extraneous  adornments 
which  bring  out  the  more  glaringly  the  heavy  lifeless- 
ness  of  his  play.  In  accordance  with  an  undramatic 
convention  fashionable  at  the  time  and  exemplified  in 
"Soliman  and  Perseda,"  the  deeds  of  Alphonsus  are 
framed  within  an  elaborate  mythological  masque  of 
Venus  and  the  Muses.  Many  speeches  are  deprived  of 
force  by  studied  imitations  of  the  Euphuistic  style,  — 
such  as  allusions  to  the  curious  herb  which  enables  the 
severed  snake  to  join  together  its  "battered  corpse"; 
to  the  Asbeston  stone,  "Which,  if  it  once  be  heat  in 
flames  of  fire,  Denieth  to  becommen  colde  againe"; 
and  to  the  fabled  Echinus;  while  the  wife  and  daughter 
of  the  Turkish  Emperor  are  frankly  presented  as  war- 
ring Amazons.  The  listlessness  of  the  portrayal  of 
Alphonsus's  continual  victories  is  relieved,  in  a  manner 
eagerly  followed  by  later  writers  of  dull  plays,  by  inter- 
polated exhibitions  of  magic.  Medea  conjures  up  Cal- 
chas,  dressed  surprisingly  "in  a  white  surplise  and 
a  Cardinals  Myter,"  at  the  court  of  Amurack;  and 
Mahomet  prophesies  through  a  brazen  head  to  the 
Turkish  princes. 

In  the  next  two  plays  of  Greene — "The  Look- 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  247 

ing  Glass  for  London,"  written  in  conjunction  with 
Thomas  Lodge,  and  "Orlando  Furioso"  —  the  influ- 
ence of  "Tamburlaine"  is  likewise  conspicuous.  The 
ranting  blasphemy  of  Rasni,  King  of  Nineveh,  and  the 
magniloquent  speeches  of  Orlando,  with  the  picture 
of  the  servile  bands  of  kings  that  attend  on  each,  are 
clearly  copied  from  Marlowe;  but  neither  the  intro- 
duction of  spectacular  stage  business  and  a  number  of 
tolerable  comic  scenes  in  the  former  play,  nor  the  bor- 
rowing of  the  Kydian  theme  of  heroic  insanity  in  the 
latter  saves  them  from  the  inevitable  failure  incident 
to  the  disparity  between  the  grandeur  of  the  stolen 
shreds  and  patches  of  language  and  the  psychological 
poverty  of  the  speakers.  Greene  had  a  great  work  to  do 
hi  English  comedy;  but  his  attempts  at  straining  the 
delicate  pastoral  note  with  which  nature  had  alone  en- 
dowed him  into  a  semblance  of  Marlowe's  passionate 
soul-expression  served  only  to  show  how  unique  was  at 
this  time  the  tragical  gift  of  the  latter  poet. 

One  of  the  most  readable  of  the  humbler  imitations 
of  "Tamburlaine"  is  an  anonymous  play  acted  by  the 
Children  of  the  Queen's  Chapel  and  preserved  in  a  very 
carelessly  printed  edition,  dated  1594.  This  work,  en- 
titled "The  Warres  of  Cyrus  King  of  Persia  against  ^ 
Antiochus  King  of  Assyria,  with  the  Tragicall  ende  of 
Panthaea,"  derives  its  plot  from  the  "Cyropsedia"  of 
Xenophon,  of  which  a  complete  translation  had  ap- 
peared as  early  as  1567.  The  Marlovian  influence  is 
everywhere  evident:  in  the  versification;  in  the  general 
treatment  of  the  grandiose  theme  of  conflicting  Asiatic 
empires,  each  with  its  host  of  tributary  kings  and 
chieftains;  and  in  the  high  romantic  development  given 
to  the  interests  both  of  love  and  war.  It  would  seem 


248  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

that  reminiscence  of  the  second  part  of  "Tambur- 
laine  "  was  particularly  strong  in  the  mind  of  the  author. 
The  treatment  of  the  Panthaea-Araspas-Abradatas 
love  episode  —  the  only  one  of  the  several  independ- 
ent stories  which  reaches  a  dramatic  conclusion  —  is 
pretty  clearly  indebted  to  the  Olympia-Theridamas  > 
scenes  in  "Tamburlaine  II."  Moreover,  in  the  man- 
agement of  the  figure  of  Cyrus,  the  titular  hero,  the 
play  shows  a  decided  change  from  the  procedure  of  the 
first  part  of  "  Tamburlaine  "  and  the  immediate  imita- 
tions of  that  work.  The  latter  plays  concentrate  atten- 
tion wholly  upon  the  chief  personage,  whose  rise  they 
portray  from  humble  beginnings  to  the  attainment  of 
unexampled  magnificence.  Cyrus,  however,  in  the 
drama  under  discussion,  occupies  a  position  much  more 
like  that  of  Tamburlaine  in  Marlowe's  second  play.  He 
is  the  undisputed  conqueror,  who  has  reached  the 
zenith  of  his  glory,  and  who  reigns  secure  through  the 
entire  progress  of  the  action.  Consequently,  the  dra- 
matic interest,  instead  of  following  the  single  career  of 
the  ruling  genius  of  the  world  portrayed,  divides  itself 
among  the  different  minor  figures  upon  which  the 
hero's  brilliance  has  cast  reflected  splendor.  In  the 
second  part  of  "Tamburlaine,"  to  be  sure,  though 
many  scenes  deal  with  the  independent  adventures 
of  Sigismond  and  Orcanes,  Callepine,  Theridamas  and 
Techelles,  the  personality  of  Tamburlaine  himself  is 
always  kept  clearly  in  view,  and  the  apparently  scat- 
tered threads  of  narrative  all  lead  up  to  the  final  glorifi- 
cation of  the  world-conqueror  in  the  last  act.  The  au- 
thor of  "The  Warres  of  Cyrus"  has  been  able  to  endow 
his  hero  with  no  such  all-pervasive  significance,  and 
his  play  consequently  lacks  unity  of  impression  as  well 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  249 

as  unity  of  structure.  The  very  exaltation  of  Cyrus's 
character  to  a  height  of  vague  nobility  where  he  shows 
himself  superior  to  the  human  passions  of  love,  hatred, 
envy,  and  almost  even  of  ambition,  makes  this  figure 
necessarily  pale  and  bloodless.  Indeed,  he  finds  a  truer 
counterpart  in  the  amiably  insipid  hero  of  Howe's 
"  Tamerlane  "  than  in  the  infinitely  more  sympathetic, 
though  faultier  Tamburlaine  of  Marlowe. 

In  "Doctor  Faustus"  Marlowe  first  took  up  a 
strictly  tragic  theme.  The  main  idea  is  again  that  of 
infinite  aspiration  expressed  in  a  single  colossal  figure. 
In  the  case  of  this  play,  however,  the  hero's  ambition 
to  sway  "All  things  that  moue  betweene  the  quiet 
poles  "  takes  a  direction  which,  instead  of  leading  him 
through  a  succession  of  individual  triumphs,  brings 
him  immediately  into  conflict  with  the  fundamental 
moral  laws,  and  broaches  an  issue  soluble  only  in  the 
terrific  final  scene.  In  this  play,  the  special  feature  of 
the  heroic  drama,  the  treatment  of  a  central  hero  who 
dares  and  does  to  the  uttermost,  has  attained  its  great- 
est imaginable  development.  It  testifies  strongly  to 
the  inherent  appeal  of  this  conception  that  "Doctor 
Faustus,"  though  grossly  violating  the  rules  of  dramatic 
structure  and  greatly  qualifying  its  effectiveness  by  the 
interpolation  of  comic  scenes  of  unutterable  bathos, 
was  yet  on  the  Elizabethan  stage,  and  remains,  even 
when  presented  on  that  of  to-day,  one  of  the  most  suc- 
cessful tragedies  which  the  age  produced. 

The  opportunity  for  the  pure  heroic  play,  in  which 
the  entire  interest  was  focused  upon  a  single  figure, 
was  naturally  limited,  and  grew  more  so  with  the 
development  of  critical  taste  and  the  emergence  of 
rival  themes.  Relatively  few  characters  possessed  of 


250  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

sufficient  vividness  and  novelty  to  hold  the  undivided 
attention  through  a  performance  could  be  imagined; 
and  the  successful  presentation  of  such  a  character 
required  very  unusual  poetic  power.  To  Marlowe's 
great  portraits  of  Tamburlaine  and  Faustus  should 
be  added  Shakespeare's  treatment  of  Richard  III, 
a  surprisingly  human  presentment  of  the  Machiavel- 
lian type;  as  well  as  the  apotheosis  of  the  hero-king 
in  "Henry  V,"  and  probably  the  less  happy  efforts  of 
Chapman  in  the  Biron  and  Bussy  d'Ambois  plays. 
The  final  triumph  of  the  species  is  the  figure  of  Hamlet, 
where  we  find  a  close  study  of  a  complex  individual 
superimposed  upon  a  preexistent  melodramatic  plot. 

It  was  in  its  disintegration  that  the  heroic  drama 
exerted  its  widest  influence.  Only  by  distributing  the 
psychological  interest  among  a  number  of  figures  was 
it  possible  either  to  secure  an  approximation  to  real 
conditions  of  life  or  to  make  use  of  the  infinite  permu- 
tations of  mood  due  to  the  interaction  of  the  various 
figures  upon  one  another.  Only  by  such  procedure, 
moreover,  was  it  practicable  to  reconcile  interest  in 
character  with  interest  in  plot.  The  execution  of  these 
final  perfections  was  the  main  contribution  of  Shake- 
speare's tragic  practice.  It  was  he  who  extended  charac- 
ter interest  and  psychological  truth  from  the  protago- 
nists of  the  drama  to  its  meanest  subordinates;  and  it 
was  he,  equally,  who,  while  normally  resting  the  chief 
attention  upon  individual  character,  yet  made  the  pre- 
sentment of  character  advance  by  means  of  the  fullest 
stage  action  and  the  most  careful  evolution  of  a  dra- 
matic plot. 

Marlowe's  last  great  tragedies,  "The  Jew  of  Malta" 
and  "Edward  II,"  show  important  variations  from  the 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  251 

type  of  heroic  drama.  In  the  former  play,  excessive 
engrossment  with  melodramatic  plot  effect,  due  prob- 
ably to  the  example  of  Kyd,  causes  the  total  distortion  -' 
of  the  main  figure.  It  may  even  be  questioned  whether 
the  vivid  portrayal  of  Barabas  in  the  first  acts  is  not 
rather  an  unconscious  reminiscence  of  the  poet's  earlier 
manner  than  a  part  of  his  serious  aim.  "Edward  II" 
displays  an  evident  desire  to  escape  from  the  one-man 
type  of  drama;  and  this  escape  is  effected  —  rather 
curiously  and  somewhat  to  the  detriment  of  the  piece 
—  not  by  the  juxtaposition  of  several  figures  of  equiv- 
alent dramatic  weight,  but  by  giving  predominating 
importance  to  each  of  three  or  four  during  various  por- 
tions of  the  play.  Gaveston,  Edward  and  Young  Mor- 
timer never  become  parties  in  an  equal  tragic  conflict, 
but  each  in  turn  assumes  the  centre  of  the  stage  and 
absorbs  the  attention  of  the  spectators  almost  as  com- 
pletely during  his  period  of  ascendancy  as  Tamburlaine 
and  Faustus  had  done  before.  "The  Jew  of  Malta" 
and  "Edward  II"  show,  therefore,  that  Marlowe's 
practical  experience  was  teaching  him  the  necessity  of 
presenting  plot  as  well  as  character,  and  that  he  did 
not  hesitate  in  pursuit  of  the  former  interest  to  make 
very  heavy  sacrifices  in  poetic  and  psychological  effect. 
Shakespeare's  "Richard  II"  is  an  obvious  deriva- 
tive from  "Edward  II,"  and  represents  an  advance 
chiefly  in  the  answer  which  it  gives  to  the  problem 
merely  evaded  in  the  other  play.  Here,  for  perhaps  the 
first  time,  plot  interest  and  character  interest  are  com- 
bined by  the  treatment  of  a  conflict  arising  from  the 
opposition  of  contrasted  mental  types.  The  impracti- 
cal and  unreliable,  though  emotionally  rich,  nature  of 
Richard  is  set  forth  with  the  broad  full  delineation 


252  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

accorded  to  Marlowe's  Tamburlaine  and  Faustus  and 
to  Shakespeare's  earlier  figure  of  Richard  III;  but  by 
outlining  against  this  poetic  hero  the  complementary 
personality  of  the  political  hero,  Bolingbroke,  and  by 
attributing  the  misfortunes  of  Richard  to  his  lack  of  ' 
qualities  possessed  by  his  successful  rival,  the  author 
at  once  motivates  the  action  of  the  piece,  and  brings 
his  careful  portrayal  of  each  of  the  main  figures  into 
direct  relation  both  with  the  incidents  of  the  plot  and 
with  a  definite  theory  of  life.  The  device  thus  inaugu-  l 
rated  of  evolving  plot  out  of  the  conflict  of  antagonistic 
types  of  character  became  the  means  by  which  Shake- 
speare attained  some  of  his  greatest  triumphs.  The  con- 
trast between  Brutus  and  Cassius,  Antony  and  Octa- 
vius,  Othello  and  lago,  gave  him  opportunity  not  only 
for  the  most  brilliant  revelations  of  character,  but  also 
for  the  most  thrilling  scenes  of  intrigue  and  action. 

Thus  the  heroic  play,  having  inculcated  the  study  of 
the  human  personality,  gave  place  to  the  more  accurate 
reflection  of  life  which  it  had  made  possible.  In  the 
time  of  Shakespeare's  maturity  the  only  plays  of  heroic 
type  really  holding  the  public  ear  were,  with  a  few  excep- 
tions, the  chronicle  histories,  which  detailed  in  loosely 
cohering  scenes  the  most  notable  events  in  the  lives  of 
familiar  national  characters.  These  plays,  constituting, 
with  the  other  histories,  a  class  apart,  owed  their  tem- 
porary vogue  to  special  conditions  and  require  separate 
discussion. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A.  SIMPLE  DRAMATIZATIONS  OF  HEROIC  STORY 

(a)  Early  Robin  Hood  Plays.  Robin  Hood  and  the  Sheriff" 
of  Nottingham.    MS.    fragment,   ca.    1485.     Printed 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  253 

J.  M.  G.,  Notes  and  Queries,  Oct.  27, 1855  ;  F.  J.  Child, 
Ballads,  iii,  90  ;  J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  i,  1897;  Ma- 
lone  Society  "Collections,"  i,  2,  1908.  A  Play  of  Robin 
Hood  for  May-Games.  Two  early  editions  printed,  with- 
out date  by  W.  Copland  and  E.  White  respectively. 
(The  work  is  made  up  of  two  separate  plays  :  Robin 
Hood  and  the  Friar,  and  Robin  Hood  and  the  Potter.) 
Reprinted,  Child,  Manly,  and  Malone  Society,  as  above. 

(5)  Sir  Cly omon  and  Sir  Clamy des.  "  As  it  hath  been 
sundry  times  Acted  by  her  Maiesties  Players,"  1599. 
Reprinted,  A.  Dyce,  Works  of  George  Peele,  voL  iii, 
1839.  Discussion :  L.  Kellner,  Engl.  Stud.,  xiii  (1889), 
187-229  (a  valuable  article,  disproving  Peele's  author- 
ship) ;  R.  Fischer,  "  Zur  Frage  nach  der  Authorschaft 
von  C.  &  C.,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xiv  (1890),  344-365 ;  G.  L. 
Kittredge,  « Notes  on  Elizabethan  Plays,"  Jrl.  Germ. 
Phil.,  ii,  7  ff. 

(c)  Common  Conditions.  Printed  for  J.  Hunter,  n.  d.  Re- 
printed, A.  Brandl,  Quellen,  1898  ;  J.  S.  Farmer,  Anon. 
Plays  (4th  Series),  1908. 

B.  DECADENT  HEROIC  PLATS 

George  a  Greene,  the  Pinner  of  Wakefield.  See  bibliogra- 
phy on  p.  293. 

Mucedorus.  "  A  Most  pleasant  Comedie  of  Musedorus  the 
kings  son  ue  of  Valentia  and  Amadine  the  kings  daughter  of 
Arragon,"  1598.  Reprinted  1606.  "  Amplified  with  new  addi- 
tions, as  it  was  acted  before  the  Kings  Maiestie,"  1610.  At 
least  thirteen  later  seventeenth-century  editions  are  known. 
Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier,  1824  ;  N.  Delius,  1874  ;  Hazlitt't 
Dodsley,  vii  ;  Warnke  and  Proescholdt,  1878 ;  C.  F.  T. 
Brooke,  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha,  1908.  For  discussion,  see 
Bibliography  to  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 

Pair  Em.  See  bibliography  on  p.  293. 

HKYWOOD,  THOMAS  :  The  Four  Prentices  of  London.  With 
the  Conquest  of  Jerusalem,  1615.  Second  edition,  1632. 
Reprinted,  A  ncient  British  Drama,  1810,  vol.  iii ;  Reed's  and 
Collier's  Dodsley. 

The  Trial  of  Chivalry.  "  With  the  life  and  death  of  Canaliero 
Dicke  Bowyer.  As  it  hath  bin  lately  acted  by  the  right  Hon- 


254  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

curable  the  Earle  of  Darby  his  servants,"  1605.  Reprinted, 
A.  H.  Bullen,  Old  English  Plays,  iii,  1884. 

The  Distracted  Emperor.  Preserved  in  Brit.  Mus.  MS- 
Printed,  A.  H.  Bullen,  Old  English  Plays,  iii,  1884. 

C.  TRAVESTIES  OF  HEROIC  DRAMA 

PEELE,  GEORGE  :  The  Old  Wives'  Tale.  "  Played  by  the 
Queenes  Maiesties  players.  Written  by  G.  P.,"  1595.  Reprinted 
in  editions  of  Peele's  Works,  A.  Dyce,  1828,  1861,  1879  ; 
A.  H.  Bulleu,  1888.  Separately  reprinted,  F.  B.  Gummere  in 
Representative  English  Comedies,  1903  ;  Malone  Society,  1907  ; 
A.  H.  Thorndike,  Minor  Elizabethan  Drama,  ii  (Everyman's 
Library);  acting  version,  F.  W.  Cady,  1911. 

BEAUMONT,  FRANCIS,  and  FLETCHER,  JOHN  :  The  Knight  of 
the  Burning  Pestle,  1613.  Reprinted  (two  editions)  1635. 
Included  in  the  second  (1679)  Beaumont  and  Fletcher  folio, 
and  in  later  collected  editions  ;  Mermaid  edition,  vol.  i ;  H.  S. 
Murch,  Yale  Studies,  1908. 

D.  HEROIC  DRAMA  UNDER  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  MARLOWE 

MARLOWE,  CHRISTOPHER  :  works  ed.  Robinson,  1826;  A.  Dyce, 
1850,  1858  ;  Cunningham,  1870;  A.  H.  Bullen,  1885;  C.  F. 
T.  Brooke,  1910.  Inedited  reprints  published  by  Newnes, 
1905  ;  Everyman's  Library,  1909.  The  "  best  plays  "  ed.  H.  El- 
lis, Mermaid  series.  General  discussion :  J.  Le  Gay  Brereton, 
three  papers  on  Marlowe  in  "  Elizabethan  Drama.  Notes  and 
Studies,"  1909  ;  E.Faligan,  "  De  Marlovianis  Fabulis,"  1887; 
J.  H.  Ingram,  "  Chistopher  Marlowe  and  his  Associates," 
1904  ;  J.  Schipper,  "  De  Versu  Marlovii,"  1867  ;  G.  C. 
Moore  Smith,  "  Marlowe  at  Cambridge,"  Mod.  Lang.  Review, 
iv  (1909). 

Tamburlaine,  Two  Parts.  Both  printed  1590  and  1592.  The 
two  parts  reprinted  with  separate  title-pages  dated  1605  and 
1606  respectively.  Included  in  all  collected  editions  and  sep- 
arately edited  by  A.  Wagner,  1885.  Discussion :  C.  H.  Her- 
f ord  and  A.  Wagner,  "  The  Sources  of  Marlowe's  Tambur- 
laine," Academy,  xxiv,  265,  266  (Oct.  20,  1883)  ;  C.  F.  T. 
Brooke,  "Marlowe's  Tamburlaine,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes, 
March,  1910. 
Doctor  Faustus.  Printed  1604,  as  acted  by  the  Earl  of  Not- 


THE  HEROIC  PLAY  255 

tingham's  (Lord  Admiral's)  servants.  Reprinted  1609, 
1611.  Enlarged  version  printed  1616,  1619,  1620,  1624, 
1631.  A  third,  greatly  perverted,  text  was  printed  1663. 
Separately  printed,  C.  W.  Dilke,  Old  English  Plays,  i,  1814; 
W.  Wagner,  1877  ;  A.  W.  Ward,  Old  English  Drama  (with 
Friar  Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay),  1878,  etc. ;  H.  Breytnann, 
1889 ;  I.  Gollancz,  Temple  Dramatists,  1897.  Discussion : 
H.  Logeman,  "  Faustus  Notes,"  1898  ;  R.  K.  Root,  "  Two 
Notes  on  Marlowe's  Doctor  Faustus,"  Engl.  Stud.,  1910, 
144-149.  (Also  pp.  117-134  of  the  same  volume.) 

The  Jew  of  Malta.  See  bibliography  on  p.  228. 

Edward  II.  See  bibliography  on  p.  348. 
The  Wars  of  Cyrus  King  of  Persia.  "  Played  by  the  children 

of  her  Maiesties   Chappell,"  1594.     Reprinted,  W.  Keller, 

Shakespeare  Jahrbuch,  xxxvii  (1901). 

GREENE,  ROBERT:  Alphonsus,  King  of  Arragon,  1599.  Re- 
printed in  collected  editions  of  Greene.     See  bibliography, 

p.  293. 

Orlando  Furioso.  "  The  Historic  of  Orlando  Furioso  One  of 

the  twelve  Pieres  of  France,"  1594,  1599. 
LODGE,  THOMAS,  and  GREENE,  ROBERT  :  A  Looking  Glass  for 

London  and  England,  1594.  Reprinted  1598, 1602,  1617. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

ROMANTIC  COMEDY  AND   PASTORAL  COMEDY 

THE  Puritan  assailants  of  the  drama  quoted  in  the  last 
chapter l  confuse  three  distinct  species  of  literature  in 
their  mention  of  the  ungodly  materials  employed  by 
the  early  playwrights.  The  heroic  legend,  against  which 
they  inveigh  in  greatest  detail,  was  either  of  native 
origin,  or  had  been  long  naturalized  and  adopted  into 
general  currency.  We  have  seen  how  it  contributed 
indispensable  elements  to  the  evolution  of  tragedy.  The 
other  works  were  all  exotics,  —  members  of  two  great 
types  of  fiction,  each  of  which  was  only  just  establish- 
ing its  position  in  English  favor  when  the  drama  ap- 
proached maturity. 

The  debt  of  the  Elizabethan  theatre  to  the  prose 
romance  is  well  known  to  all  who  read  handbooks 
on  Shakespeare.  The  names  of  the  novels  on  which 
were  based  the  plays  of  "As  You  Like  It,"  "Twelfth 
Night,"  "  The  Winter's  Tale,"  "  Measure  for  Measure," 
"Othello,"  and  many  others,  are  sufficiently  familiar; 
while  contemporary  collections  of  stories,  like  Painter's 
"Palace  of  Pleasure"  and  its  rival,  "The  Petite  Palace 
of  Pettie  His  Pleasure,"  have  in  late  years  been  re- 
printed, and  enjoy  at  least  a  scholarly  public.  Such 
books  as  Greene's  "Pandosto,"  Lodge's  "Rosalinde," 
and  Sidney's  "Arcadia"  have  even,  it  may  be  hoped, 
passed  beyond  the  stage  of  purely  critical  interest,  and 
make  a  modest  appeal  upon  their  merits.  Works  of  this 
1  See  pp.  233,  234. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     257 

kind  were  produced  during  the  latter  half  of  Elizabeth's 
reign  in  ever  increasing  number,  occasionally  by  writers 
like  Lodge  and  Greene  and  Sidney  as  original  literature 
under  foreign  stimulus;  more  often  by  the  easy  means 
of  translation. 

A  radical  difference  appears  between  the  two  species 
of  imported  fiction  which  thus  simultaneously  con- 
tested the  popular  favor.  The  one  was  represented  by 
the  realistic  novel,  Italian  for  the  most  part  in  charac- 
ter and  in  origin.  The  tales  of  Boccaccio,  Bandello, 
Cinthio,  and  their  imitators  were  the  main  source  of 
English  compilations  like  that  of  Painter,  and  served 
throughout  the  entire  period  as  an  inexhaustible  trea- 
sury of  plot  and  a  rough  pattern  for  realistic  delineation. 
But  this  influence,  though  copiously  exerted  both  in 
comedy  and  tragedy,  was  not  deep  or  significant.  The 
greatest  dramatists  always  modified  the  crude  effects 
of  Italian  realism  by  large  imaginative  infusions;  and 
Shakespeare,  who  was  an  incessant  borrower  of  its  plot 
outlines,  never  failed  to  reject  its  philosophy  of  life. 
"Twelfth  Night "  is  a  superb  example  of  the  poet's  skill 
in  harmonizing  a  coarse  intrigue  plot  with  the  delicate 
romantic  atmosphere  which  he  derived  from  the  other 
type  of  exotic  story. 

The  second  influence  was  that  of  the  pastoral  ro- 
mance, introduced  chiefly  from  Italy  and  Spain,  pro- 
ductive first  of  a  rich  prose  literature  and  then  of  the 
peculiar  species  of  "romantic  comedy,"  which  flour- 
ished with  the  most  buoyant  life  for  a  dozen  or  fifteen 
years  and  disappeared,  never  again  to  encounter  the 
conditions  necessary  to  its  revival.  This  comedy,  of 
which  Shakespeare  is  the  unrivalled  master,  always  be- 
trayed clearly  its  non-dramatic  origin.  Assuming  upon 


258  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

its  transference  to  the  stage  rather  the  mere  setting 
than  the  substance  of  theatrical  art,  it  continued  to 
base  its  appeal  upon  the  kind  of  interest  excited  pecul- 
iarly by  narrative  fiction.  Fundamentally,  it  depends 
always  for  the  attainment  of  its  effects  upon  the  han- 
dling of  "atmosphere"  and  romantic  accident  rather 
than  psychological  interpretation  or  dramatic  intrigue. 
The  fact  is  worthy  of  the  most  careful  attention  that 
such  an  ephemeral  type,  which  obviously  only  clings 
to  the  skirts  of  true  drama,  and  with  which  so  keen  and 
delicate  a  critic  as  Hazlitt  frankly  shows  his  lack  of 
sympathy,1  should  be  the  main  instrument  of  many 
of  Shakespeare's  noblest  comic  achievements. 

The  story  of  pastoral  influence  on  European  litera- 
ture goes  back  to  the  very  beginning  of  the  renaissance 
movement.  The  eclogues  of  Vergil,  to  a  smaller  extent 
those  of  Theocritus,  and  even  more  perhaps  the  modern 
Vergilian  imitations  of  the  Italian  Mantuanus  (Bat- 
tista  Spagnuoli,  d.  1516),  introduced  writers  of  the  fif- 
teenth and  sixteenth  centuries  to  a  species  of  fiction 
which  afforded  a  very  welcome  relief  both  from  the 
blood-curdling  narratives  of  heroic  romance  and  from 
the  sordid  realism  of  the  popular  novel.  The  strict  pas- 
toral seems  seldom  to  have  appealed  to  the  more  gen- 
eral and  unfashionable  public :  it  was  essentially  too  re- 
mote from  the  real  activities  and  interests  of  men,  and 
often  too  lacking  in  excitement.  By  the  academic 
circles  of  the  Continent,  however,  this  genre  was  taken 
up  with  an  enthusiasm  which  it  is  nowadays  far  beyond 
our  power  to  comprehend.  The  accident  of  the  Vergilian 
connection  and  the  opportunity  furnished  by  the  pas- 
toral of  interweaving  constant  allusions  to  Ovidian 
1  See  Huzlitt,  English  Comic  Writers,  Lecture  II. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     259 

mythology  and  the  Golden  Age  tradition  doubtless  gave 
this  particular  art-form  a  factitious  attraction  for  the 
classic  zealots  of  the  Revival  of  Letters.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  deal  here  specifically  with  the  pastoral 
eclogues  in  verse.  The  diffusion  of  this  type  through- 
out Europe  is  well  enough  indicated  by  the  Latin  works 
of  Mantuanus,  the  court  pastorals  of  the  French 
writer,  Clement  Marot,  and  by  the  "  Shepherd's  Calen- 
dar" of  their  imitator  Spenser.  As  a  source  of  the 
Elizabethan  drama,  the  pastoral  element  requires 
consideration  under  two  aspects :  as  it  appears  in  the 
prose  pastoral  romance,  and  as  we  find  it  already  in 
dramatic  shape  in  the  plays  of  the  school  of  Tasso. 

The  first  important  pastoral  romance  is  of  the  most 
respectable  antiquity,  and  takes  us  back  far  beyond 
the  period  indicated  for  the  general  prevalence  of  the 
type.  It  is  the  "Daphnis  and  Chloe"  of  the  Alexan- 
drian Greek  poet,  Longus,  and  belongs  to  the  fifth  cen- 
tury A.  D.  The  story,  which  is  a  kind  of  foreshadowing 
of  "Paul  and  Virginia,"  deals  with  the  companionship 
and  love  of  shepherd  and  shepherdess  from  their  earli- 
est childhood.  About  the  hero  and  heroine  are  assem- 
bled the  usual  other  characters  of  the  later  pastoral 
convention:  the  wise  old  shepherds;  the  wicked  herds- 
man, in  subsequent  treatments  frequently  presented  as 
a  Satyr,  who  attempts  to  destroy  the  happiness  of  the 
lovers;  pirates  and  similar  intruders  from  the  outside 
world,  who  are  brought  into  the  story  for  the  purpose 
of  abducting  or  otherwise  afflicting  the  main  characters. 
A  contemporary  work  even  more  romantic  in  tone,  and 
likewise  written  in  decadent  Greek,  is  the  "  Ethiopian 
History  "  of  Heliodorus,  treating  the  impossible  adven- 
tures and  mutual  love  of  two  embodiments  of  all  the 


260  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

proprieties — Theagenes  and  Charicleia — who,  after 
being  captured  by  the  usual  piratical  crew  and  enduring 
numberless  accidents  and  escapes,  are  in  the  end  dis- 
covered and  made  happy  by  their  true  parents  just  in 
time  to  prevent  them  from  perishing  as  sacrifices  to  the 
patron  deity  of  their  country.  Daphnis  and  Chloe  and 
the  "  ^Ethiopica  "  were  both  rendered  into  French  before 
1550  by  Jacques  Amyot,  subsequently  the  translator 
of  Plutarch.  During  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  there  ap- 
peared an  English  version  of  Longus's  pastoral  by  An- 
gel Day  (1587),  while  Heliodorus  was  very  splendidly 
translated  by  Thomas  Underdowne.  These  Greek  ro- 
mances, however,  should  not  be  regarded  as  having  set 
the  pastoral  fashion.  They  were  rather  recalled  into 
vogue  by  the  existence  of  works  in  the  same  style  which 
had  arisen  independently. 

The  modern  pastoral  convention  is  said  to  begin  with 
the  "Ameto"  of  Boccaccio,  a  work  centring  about  the 
lamentations  of  seven  nymphs,  who  relate  the  stories 
of  their  unhappy  love  to  a  model  listener  —  the  shep- 
herd Ameto.  At  the  end  of  each  tale  metrical  eclogues 
are  inserted,  and  we  thus  find  the  blending  of  prose 
fiction  and  lyric  so  usual  in  the  pastoral  romances  of 
the  Elizabethans.  Another  famous  Italian  work  is  the 
"Arcadia"  of  Sannazzaro,  first  published  in  1502. 
Though  hardly  a  true  pastoral  on  any  analysis,  it  gave 
to  Sidney's  book  a  good  deal  more  than  its  mere  name,  V 
and  did  as  much,  doubtless,  as  any  single  production  of 
the  time  to  originate  interest  in  the  type. 

Much  the  most  important  of  the  developed  pastoral 
romances  is  the  "Diana"  of  the  Spaniard  Jorge  dev 
Montemayor,1  a  book  which  had  an  enormous  vogue, 

1  Montemayor  was  by  birth  a  Portuguese,  but  wrote  Castiliati. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     261 

and  settled  for  a  considerable  period  the  structure  and 
subject  matter  of  the  type.  An  English  translation  of 
the  "Diana,"  by  Bartholomew  Yong,  was  published 
in  1598,  but  had  been  executed,  the  preface  tells  us, 
many  years  before.  The  work  is  a  complex  tissue  of 
narratives  of  misfortune  in  love,  related  successively 
by  various  shepherds  and  nymphs.  It  is  best  known  to 
the  Shakespeare  student  from  the  circumstances  that 
the  tale  of  the  Shepherdess  Felismena  appears  to  have 
suggested  the  story  of  Proteus  and  .Julia  in  "The  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  and  that  the  Shepherd  Mon- 
tane may  have  suggested  the  name  of  a  character  in 
"Othello"  and  another  in  the  older  version  of  "  Ham- 
let." Yet  the  book  is  by  no  means  uninteresting  in 
itself,  and  its  interspersed  songs  possess  very  consider- 
able merit  in  Yong's  translation.  It  is  worth  noting,  as 
an  indication  of  the  novel's  popularity,  that  the  com- 
piler of  the  anthology,  "England's  Helicon,"  quotes 
Yong's  versions  of  Montemayor  more  frequently,  I 
think,  than  he  cites  any  of  the  native  English  poets. 

The  limited  plot  material  and  monotonous  atmos- 
phere of  the  pastoral  convention  were  in  themselves 
unsuited  to  that  indefinite  expansion  to  which  all  popu- 
lar renaissance  themes  were  likely  to  be  subjected. 
Such  works  de  tongue  haleine  as  the  "  Diana  "  could  be 
spun  out  of  the  thin  web  of  pastoral  incident  only  by 
the  extensive  interpolation  of  conventional  material 
from  the  heroic  romance.  A  tendency  to  the  introduc- 
tion of  adventurous  incident  is  observable  in  "Daphnis 
and  Chloe,"  and,  in  much  higher  degree,  in  the  "./Ethi- 
opica"  of  Heliodorus.  The  Spanish  school  of  Monte- 
mayor,  from  which  Sidney  inherited,  pushed  to  the 
final  limit  the  ridiculous  combination  of  nymphs  and 


262  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

shepherds  from  the  pastoral  world  with  knights,  mon- 
sters, and  sorcerers  out  of  the  old  romances.  The  conse- 
quences of  this  melange  can  be  traced  not  only  in  such 
narrative  works  as  the  "Arcadia"  and  the  "Faerie 
Queene,"  but  also  in  the  variegated  effects  of  humble 
plays  like  "Mucedorus,"  and  in  the  universal  fond- 
ness among  more  meritorious  dramas  for  the  insertion 
of  sylvan  or  pastoral  scenes  within  the  articulations  of 
a  serious  plot. 

The  more  legitimately  pastoral  sections  of  the 
"Diana"  exemplify  pretty  well  the  entire  range,  in 
point  of  machinery,  atmosphere,  and  incident,  of  the 
pastoral  novels  of  Greene  and  Lodge;  and  it  was  by 
means  of  such  works  as  the  "Menaphon"  and  "Rosa- 
linde"  of  these  writers  that  pastoral  influence  most 
seriously  impressed  the  English  drama.  The  effect  of 
the  Italian  pastoral  play  appears  to  have  been  later  in 
date,  and  certainly  it  produced  less  general  results. 

Neither  in  the  romances  of  Montemayor  and  Sidney, 
nor  in  the  simpler  novels  of  the  type,  is  the  pastoral 
convention  treated  with  seriousness  or  consistency.  To 
a  smaller  extent  even  than  in  the  Italian  play  is  the  life 
of  the  imaginary  shepherd  society  described  for  any  in- 
trinsic interest  of  its  own.  Montemayor  uses  the  pas- 
toral setting,  as  Mr.  Stanley  Weyman  uses  the  setting 
of  French  history,  merely  to  furnish  an  environment 
sufficiently  vague  and  remote  from  real  life  for  the  free 
movement  of  stories  of  knightly  love  and  adventure. 
The  same  thing  is  true  in  the  main  of  the  novels  of 
Greene  and  Lodge.  The  success  of  these  works  was  not 
conditioned  upon  the  portrayal  of  manners  or  types  of 
character  such  as  might  be  imagined  to  exist  among 
Arcadian  shepherds;  it  resulted  rather  from  the  curi- 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     2C3 

osity  to  know  how  the  tangled  mesh  of  incident  was  to 
be  untwisted  in  the  end,  and  from  the  presentation  of 
a  thoroughly  fanciful  world  whose  attractiveness  con- 
sisted in  its  entire  freedom  from  realistic  trammels. 

The  prose  pastorals  in  England  and  elsewhere  would 
thus  appear  nearly  destitute  of  dramatic  possibilities. 
That  they  should,  notwithstanding,  have  exercised  so 
appreciable  an  influence  as  they  did  upon  comedy 
seems  at  first  almost  paradoxical;  yet  the  phenomenon 
is  at  once  explained  when  one  comes  to  examine  the 
particular  plays  produced  under  the  tutelage  of  such 
works.  It  is  not  definitely  pastoral  dramas,  like  "The 
Sad  Shepherd"  and  "The  Faithful  Shepherdess"  that 
show  the  influence  of  Montemayor's  school.  It  is  rather 
the  unique  and  exquisitely  beautiful  art-form  which  we 
call,  par  excellence,  Romantic  Comedy,  work  like  the 
sylvan  parts  of  Greene's  "James  IV  "  and  "  Friar  Bacon 
and  Friar  Bungay"  and  Shakespeare's  "As  You  Like 
It"  and  "Twelfth  Night." 

Robert  Greene  may  be  safely  reckoned  as  the  founder 
of  this  type  of  drama;  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that 
what  Greene  put  into  romantic  comedy  was  precisely 
what  he  had  learned  as  a  writer  of  pastoral  romances. 
In  the  typical  plays  of  Greene  and  in  the  related  com- 
edies of  Shakespeare's  middle  and  latest  periods,  the 
interest  excited  by  the  presentation  of  a  dramatic  con- 
flict is  reduced  or  evanescent.  Comparatively  speaking, 
there  is  little  psychological  development.  Many  of  the 
characters  are  quite  shadowy;  none  —  considering  the 
known  powers  of  the  writer  —  is  possessed  of  the  high- 
est degree  of  dramatic  intensity.  These  plays  depend 
for  their  great  attractiveness  upon  just  the  elements 
which  one  finds  in  novels  like  "  Menaphon  "  and  "  Pan- 


264  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

dosto," — upon  an  imaginary  "atmosphere,"  half  pas- 
toral, half  that  of  fairyland,  and  upon  the  series  of 
absorbing  adventures  which  befall  the  actors  without 
their  very  serious  responsibility. 

Thus,  the  primary  influence  of  the  great  pastoral 
literature  of  the  Renaissance  upon  the  Elizabethan 
theatre  had  for  its  chief  result  the  domestication  within 
the  drama  of  essentially  non-dramatic  narrative  ideals 
derived  from  the  contaminated  pastoral  novels  of  the 
day.  One  reason  for  this  is,  naturally,  the  enormous 
current  demand  for  all  sorts  of  theatrical  entertainment, 
the  inability  to  supply  this  demand  from  the  slender 
resources  of  existing  comedy  and  tragedy,  and  the  con- 
sequent attraction  upon  the  stage  of  literary  matter 
which  properly  belonged  outside  the  walls  of  the  thea- 
tre, and  which  in  all  other  epochs  has  found  narrative 
expression.  Greene,  an  ardent  seeker  after  popularity, 
already  famous  as  the  author  of  pastoral  novels,  saw 
his  opportunity.  By  dressing  his  essentially  fictional 
themes  in  rough  dramatic  guise,  he  instituted  a  new 
species  of  comedy,  which  from  first  to  last  comprised 
stories  of  love  and  sylvan  adventure  rather  than  plays 
dealing  with  human  character  and  conflict.1  It  is  not 
easy  to  criticise  this  type.  Its  successful  exemplifica- 
tion, as  well  as  its  very  existence,  was  the  result  of  its 
falling  upon  an  age  which  qualified  the  eager  search 
into  the  truth  of  actuality  by  a  peculiarly  large  admix- 
ture of  romantic  nonsense,  and  read  a  mystic  philosophy 
into  the  trite  impossibilities  of  the  nursery  tale.  The 

1  The  relations  between  Greene's  early  pastoral  novels  and  his 
romantic  comedies  is  thus  precisely  analogous  to  that  which  exists 
between  Lyly's  Euphues  and  the  latter  writer's  courtly  comedies 
in  euphuistic  prose.  See  p.  171  ff. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     965 

mouth  of  the  judicial  theorist  is  stopped  by  the  fact 
that  the  greatest  artist  of  the  day  moulded  in  this  form 
the  brightest  and  most  universally  loved  plays  of  his 
maturity  and  by  the  further  marvel  that  he  chose  the 
same  fragile  and  even  trivial  vehicle  for  the  last  deep 
fraught  expression  of  his  ripened  age. 

Pastoral  drama  of  a  kind  had  been  freely  produced 
during  the  decade  immediately  previous  to  Greene's 
first  concern  with  the  type.  But  all  these  works,  ini- 
tiated perhaps  by  Peele's  graceful  "Arraignment  of 
Paris  "and  continued  in  the  sylvan  comedies  of  Lyly, 
are  expressions  of  courtly  scholarship,  compacted  of 
mythological  anecdote  with  varied  reminiscences  of  the 
classical  eclogue.  They  show  no  demonstrable  trace  of 
that  influence  of  the  pastoral  romance  which  was  the 
determining  factor  in  romantic  comedy. 

Greene's  first  venture  in  the  new  style,  "Friar 
Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay,"  is  a  medley  illustrating  to  a 
degree  unusual  even  in  the  plays  of  this  imitative  writer 
the  desire  to  profit  by  all  the  current  recommendations 
to  popularity.  It  cannot  be  doubted  that  the  comedy 
owes  its  original  conception  to  the  vogue  of  Marlowe's  ' 
"Faustus,"  just  as  Greene's  "Alphonsus"  had  earlier 
been  prompted  by  the  success  of  "Tamburlaine."  In 
the  interval  which  had  elapsed  since  the  production  of 
the  earlier  work,  Greene  had  measured  the  range  of  his 
dramatic  powers.  By  selecting  a  supernatural  theme 
inherently  much  lighter  than  the  dark  story  of  Faust, 
and  by  restricting  himself  to  the  presentation  of  the 
most  innocent  feats  of  white  magic,  Greene  introduced 
upon  the  stage  a  type  of  beneficent,  romantic  conjurer 
which  long  enjoyed  an  unusual  vogue.  The  main  appeal 
of  this  most  popular  play  lay,  however,  less  in  the  do- 


266  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

ings  of  its  two  titular  heroes  than  in  the  conventional 
romantic  portrayal  of  the  love  of  Edward  and  the  Lord 
Lacy.  Here,  in  the  intercourse  of  prince  and  peer  with 
the  humble  pastoral  nymph  among  the  cream-pots  of 
the  dairy  and  the  booths  of  the  rustic  fair,  or  in  the 
avenues  of  the  King's  forest,  Greene  found  a  thoroughly 
congenial  subject,  in  the  elaboration  of  which  he  has 
blended  the  gracefully  unreal  atmosphere  of  the  fa- 
miliar pastoral  novel  with  certain  touches  of  truer  feel- 
ing and  closer  observation.  In  accordance  with  a  taste 
which  Greene  perhaps  began,  the  vagueness  of  the 
Utopian  setting  of  this  play  has  been  relieved,  without 
being  brought  at  all  closer  to  the  truth  of  nature,  by 
the  introduction  of  fanciful  portraits  of  real  persons. 
Henry  III  and  his  heir,  the  three  visiting  sovereigns 
of  Germany,  Castile,  and  Saxony,  and  the  prominent 
nobles  of  the  time  are  pictured  in  consciously  unhistoric 
lights;  while  Eleanor  —  the  reward  bestowed  by  poetic 
justice  upon  the  prince  in  return  for  his  magnanimous 
surrender  of  Margaret  —  is  idealized  with  an  indiffer- 
ence to  actual  fact  probably  no  less  complete  than  that 
which  permitted  Peele  in  his  "Edward  I"  to  paint  the 
same  reputable  queen  as  a  monster  of  infidelity. 

It  is  generally  agreed  that  the  chief  merit  of  Greene's 
romantic  plays,  "Friar  Bacon"  and  "James  IV," 
apart  from  the  creation  of  their  fresh  atmosphere,  lies 
in  the  character  of  his  heroines,  Margaret,  Dorothea, 
and  Ida;  and  that  these  figures,  together  with  the  idyl- 
lic environment  they  carry  with  them,  are  a  direct  im- 
portation from  Greene's  pastoral  novels.  The  type  of 
woman  so  presented,  always  essentially  the  same,  and 
sprung  originally,  it  seems,  from  the  poet's  most  inti- 
mate personal  experience,  remained  an  established 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     267 

figure  in  romantic  comedy,  and  gave  the  species  its 
distinctive  tone.  It  was  doubtless  Greene's  initiative 
which  placed  the  action  of  Shakespeare's  similar  plays 
in  a  woman's  world,  remote  always  from  realistic  so- 
phistication,—  a  world  of  sentiment  rather  than  rea- 
son, in  which  Rosalind,  Viola,  Imogen  and  Perdita 
tend  to  outvalue  their  masculine  associates. 

A  capita]  fault  in  Greene's  dramatic  method  was  al- 
ways the  attempt  to  crowd  into  each  individual  play  the 
entire  stock  of  incidents  and  plot  devices  at  his  com- 
mand. This  tendency  doubtless  accounts  for  the  dog- 
in-the-manger  attitude  toward  other  dramatists  mani-  J 
fested  in  Greene's  famous  "Groatsworth  of  Wit."  It 
explains  also  the  mingling  in  his  own  plays  of  tawdry 
imitations  from  all  the  earlier  styles  with  many  hasty 
and  superficial  sketches  of  original  motifs,  ineffective 
in  Greene's  presentment,  but  requiring  only  the  care- 
ful development  of  Shakespeare  and  other  plagiarists 
of  genius  to  become  extraordinarily  fruitful.  "Friar 
Bacon "  contains  much  which  can  only  be  understood 
either  as  a  deliberate  bait  for  vulgar  popularity  or  an 
archaic  survival  from  outworn  styles.  A  spurious 
affinity  to  the  mythological  court  comedy  of  Peele  and 
Lyly  is  suggested  by  interlarding  the  speech  'of  the 
peasant  maid  of  Fressingfield  with  allusions  to  Phoebus 
and  Semele,  Paris,  ^Enon,  and  the  vale  of  Troy.  Much 
of  the  magical  business,  such  as  the  spiriting  of  the 
Hostess  of  Henley  and  Friar  Bungay  through  the  air, 
and  the  conjuring  rigid  of  swords  and  tongues,  is  little 
more  than  a  copy  from  some  of  the  most  prosaic  scenes 
of  "Faustus";  while  the  final  identification  of  the  clown, 
Miles,  with  the  old  vice,  and  his  dispatch  to  hell  on  the 
devil's  back  are  still  franker  retrogressions  to  the  low 


268  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

art  level  of  the  interlude.  All  this  extraneous  and  ill- 
digested  matter,  together  with  the  unfortunate  attempt 
to  add  the  specious  attraction  of  chronicle  history  to  a 
work  of  pure  imagination,  confuses  the  issues  of  the 
play,  and  diverts  attention  from  the  strain  of  fanciful 
idealism  which  it  derives  from  the  pastoral  romance 
and  to  which  it  owes  its  particular  charm.  By  isolat- 
ing and  developing  this  special  feature,  Shakespeare 
brought  into  strong  relief  the  merits  apprehended  only 
subconsciously  by  the  readers  of  Greene. 

"The  Scottish  History  of  James  IV,"  probably 
Greene's  latest  play,  marks  a  considerable  advance  in 
style,  but  hardly  shows  any  improvement  in  its  treat- 
ment of  dramatic  plot  and  character.  The  artificial 
mythological  verbiage,  a  notable  mannerism  of  the 
earlier  plays,  has  been  almost  entirely  supplanted;  but 
the  author  continues  to  depend  for  the  success  of  the 
comedy  rather  upon  the  inclusion  of  a  great  variety  of 
possible  sources  of  interest  than  upon  the  harmonious 
evolution  of  a  single  theme.  The  main  subject  is  de- 
rived, with  very  substantial  alterations,  from  an  Italian 
novel  of  Cinthio  ("  Hecatommithi,"  3d  decade,  1). 
Yet  the  real  merit  of  the  drama  consists  in  the  idyllic 
story  which  evolves  about  the  two  heroines,  both  em- 
bodiments of  the  unworldly  type,  who  live  and  love, 
resist  temptation,  or  wander  in  disguise  through  a  syl- 
van land  of  romance  wholly  antipodal  to  the  world  of 
chicanery  and  politics  tenanted  by  the  insurrectionary 
Scottish  peers,  the  classical  parasite,  Ateukin,  and  the 
symbolical  Lawyer,  Merchant,  and  Divine  of  Act  V, 
scene  4.  The  title  of  the  piece  and  the  thin  political 
scenes,  lacking  equally  in  verity  and  verisimilitude,  are 
dishonest  appeals  to  the  temporary  taste  for  history 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     269 

plays.  They  make  only  the  slightest  impression  upon 
the  reader,  who  remembers  the  play  mainly  for  its  pre- 
sentation of  the  romantic  figures  and  complex  love 
adventures  of  Dorothea  and  Ida. 

One  excrescent  element  in  this  medley  deserves  some- 
what more  sympathetic  consideration.  In  agreement 
with  the  practice  of  Kyd,  Greene  has  set  his  play  within 
a  dramatic  framework,  consisting  principally  of  the 
dialogue  of  Oberon,  King  of  Fairies  and  the  misan- 
thropic Scot  Bohan,  —  a  figure  perhaps  suggested  by 
Plutarch's  Timon.  As  it  stands,  this  introductory 
matter  offends  against  the  unity  of  the  play,  and  makes 
it  only  the  harder  to  effect  the  romantic  illusion  requi- 
site to  the  appreciation  of  the  main  plot.  Yet  the  idea 
that  prompted  the  juxtaposition  of  the  fairy  king  and 
the  soured  worldling  was  a  bold  one,  which  Shake- 
speare borrowed  with  notable  success  in  the  most  ven- 
turous of  his  romantic  comedies,  "A  Midsummer- 
Night's  Dream,"  and  again  when  in  "As  You  Like  It" 
he  made  the  melancholy  Jaques  a  denizen  of  Arden. 

A  comparison  of  "James  IV  "  with  its  closest  Shake- 
spearean parallel  will  illustrate  the  nature  of  this  kind  of 
comedy.  Instead  of  trying,  like  Greene,  to  lend  realistic 
probability  to  the  palpably  fictitious  matter  of  erotic 
romance  by  an  admixture  of  bogus  history,  Shakespeare 
chooses  the  contrary  alternative  and  frankly  throws 
down  the  thin  wall  separating  the  world  of  fancy  from 
pure  fairyland.  For  this  procedure  also  Greene  had 
indeed  thrown  out  a  blind  hint  by  making  the  sons  of 
Bohan  actors  in  the  main  drama  as  well,  but  the  inno- 
vation was  in  his  case  as  ineffective  as  it  was  unrea- 
soned. Shakespeare,  on  the  other  hand,  by  bringing  his 
Oberon  and  Titania  into  the  central  plot  as  actors  on 


270  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

equal  terms  with  the  idyllic  lovers,  both  waives  the 
necessity  of  narrowly  realistic  motivation,  and  secures 
for  his  stage  the  dainty  imaginary  setting  in  which 
alone  the  delicate  figures  of  ideal  romance  can  appear 
to  advantage.  Doubtless  the  masque-like  character  of 
"A  Midsummer-Night's  Dream"  encouraged  Shake- 
speare to  take  bolder  liberties  with  the  law  of  nature 
than  otherwise  he  would  have  attempted;  but,  through- 
out, his  practice  shows  his  denial  of  Greene's  idea  that 
an  imaginary  story  can  be  benefited  by  a  thin  disguise 
of  specious  realism.  The  very  titles  of  Shakespeare's 
most  daring  performances  in  romantic  comedy  — 
"A  Midsummer-Night's  Dream,"  "As  You  Like  It," 
"Twelfth  Night  or  What  You  Will,"  "The  Winter's 
Tale"  —  seem  meant  to  emphasize  the  fundamental 
axiom  that  dream  figures  can  only  be  presented  upon 
a  visionary  stage. 

Greene's  greatest  continuator  in  romantic  comedy 
was,  of  course,  Shakespeare.  But  several  minor  dramas 
of  the  day  show  how  the  elder  poet's  initiative  affected 
his  equals  and  inferiors,  and  illustrate  very  well  the  scope 
and  possibilities  of  this  type  of  comedy  before  Shake- 
speare had  refined  it  into  an  instrument  of  sublime  ir- 
regularity which  only  he  himself  has  ever  satisfactorily 
employed.  The  "  Pleasant  Commodie  of  f aire  Em  the 
Millers  daughter  of  Manchester:  With  the  loue  of  Wil- 
liam the  Conqueror,"  which  seems  to  have  been  pro- 
duced between  1589  and  1591, l  is  an  inartistic  medley 

1  Lord  Strange's  servants,  by  whom  the  title-page  of  the  earliest 
edition  states  the  play  to  have  been  performed,  first  appear  as  an 
acting  company  in  1589.  (For  the  origin  of  this  company,  see  W.  W. 
Greg,  Henslowe's  Diary,  ii,  71.)  The  posterior  limit  is  indicated  by 
the  fact  that  two  lines  in  Fair  Em  seem  to  be  ridiculed  in  Greene's 
Farewell  to  Folly,  1591. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     271 

of  two  plots  in  the  two  most  popular  current  styles. 
One  portion,  developed  entirely  in  the  manner  of  the 
old  heroic  play,  is  a  happy  version  of  a  French  tragical 
story.  It  treats  the  love  of  William  the  Conqueror  and 
the  Marquis  Lubeck  for  the  princesses  Blanche  and 
Mariana,  presenting  the  journey  of  the  Conqueror  in 
the  guise  of  the  errant  knight  Robert  of  Windsor  to  the 
court  of  Denmark  in  quest  of  the  lady  with  whose  image, 
displayed  on  Lubeck's  shield  at  a  tournament,  he  has 
fallen  enamoured;  depicting  his  subsequent  change  of 
passion,  and  his  abduction  of  the  one  princess  in  the 
garments  of  the  other,  together  with  the  armed  pursuit 
of  the  royal  father,  and  the  final  reconciliation  of  all 
parties.  The  second  plot  is,  on  the  other  hand,  an 
imperfect  attempt  at  pastoral  romantic  comedy,  cen- 
tring about  the  Manchester  Miller  (really  a  valiant 
knight  in  disguise),  his  fair  daughter,  and  the  three 
courtiers  who  contest  her  love  and  prove  their  false- 
hood or  fidelity  amid  these  humble  surroundings. 
The  doubtful  question  of  the  relative  priority  of  this 
play  and  "Friar  Bacon"  probably  needs  no  discussion. 
I  am  unable  to  discover  any  trace  of  the  particular 
connection  which  the  late  Professor  Churton  Collins  * 
fancied  that  he  detected  between  the  two  works.  Nor 
does  there  appear  to  exist  any  substantial  reason  either 
for  regarding  "Fair  Em"  as  an  allegorical  reflection 
of  London  stage  conditions  or  for  seeing  in  the  allu- 
sions to  local  celebrities  and  landmarks  an  indication 
that  the  play  was  originally  destined  for  presentation 
in  Manchester.  Rather,  the  probability  seems  over- 
whelming that  these  references  were  borrowed  by  the 
dramatist,  with  no  obscurer  purpose  than  the  desire 
1  Sec  Collins,  Plays  and  Poems  of  Greene,  ii,  4. 


272  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  verisimilitude  and  specific  detail,  from  the  ballad  or 
prose  narrative  upon  which  he  based  this  portion  of  the 
play.  In  any  case,  "Fair  Em"  is  far  inferior  to  "Friar 
Bacon  "  as  a  romantic  comedy.  Its  rustic  scenes,  though 
well  enough  articulated  among  themselves  and  not 
deficient  in  characterization,  possess  very  little  of  the 
idyllic  charm  which  Greene  was  able  to  impart,  and 
which  more  than  anything  else  gave  this  type  of  drama 
vital  power  at  a  time  when  the  heroic  play,  equally 
"romantic"  in  a  sense,  had  lost  all  true  hold  on  the 
progressive  theatre. 

One  of  the  most  immediate  successors  of  Greene  in 
the  writing  of  romantic  comedy  was  Anthony  Mun- 
day,  who  concerned  himself  during  the  five  or  six  years 
following  Greene's  death  with  several  ventures  in  this 
style.  The  earliest  of  these  works  appears  to  have  been 
"John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber,"  a  play  preserved 
in  a  manuscript  dated  December,  1595,  but  not  printed 
till  the  nineteenth  century.  Imitation  of  "Friar  Bacon 
and  Friar  Bungay"  seems  clear  in  the  choice  of  the 
subject  with  its  diamond-cut-diamond  theme  of  rival 
conjurors  exploiting  their  powers  in  the  attempt  to 
advance  or  retard  the  progress  of  a  complex  love  in- 
trigue. "John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber"  is  a  light- 
hearted  piece,  composed  in  very  fair  verse,  and  con- 
structed with  a  stiff  symmetry  which,  though  glaringly 
superficial,  is  yet  not  unworthy  of  the  poet  described  by 
Meres  as  the  "best  plotter"  among  the  comic  writers 
of  the  age.  In  all  the  qualities  which  lend  special  charm 
to  the  romantic  comedies  of  Greene  and  Shakespeare, 
however,  Munday's  play  shows  itself  entirely  deficient. 
Its  plot  is  likely  to  impress  the  reader  as  thin  and  bar- 
ren. It  lacks  the  varied  richness  of  tone  which,  in  spite 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     273    . 

of  all  their  patent  absurdities,  raises  both  "  Friar  Bacon  " 
and  "James  IV  "  above  the  suspicion  of  clap-trap.  The 
twin  heroines  of  "John  a  Kent,"  Sidanen  and  Marian, 
are  mere  lay  figures,  possessed  neither  of  individual 
character,  nor  even  of  any  conventional  grace;  and  the 
four  lovers  are,  if  possible,  even  more  completely  with- 
out significance.  Consequently,  the  romantic  element 
in  the  play  proves  an  almost  total  failure,  and  the  sole 
interest  hangs  upon  the  two  subsidiary  threads  of  the 
contest  between  the  magicians  and  the  interpolated 
buffoonery  of  Turnop. 

Munday's  curious  play,  "The  Downfall  of  Robert, 
Earl  of  Huntington,  afterward  called  Robin  Hood," 
was  purchased  by  Henslowe  in  February,  1598,  for  the 
use  of  the  Lord  Admiral's  Company,  by  whom  the 
edition  of  1601  states  it  to  have  been  acted.  The  un- 
necessary complexity  of  structure  which  very  generally 
characterizes  Elizabethan  dramaturgy  is  particularly 
conspicuous  in  the  "Downfall"  and  its  sequel,  "The 
Death  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Huntington."  In  both  plays 
the  events  depicted  are  separated  by  two  removes 
from  immediate  actuality,  since  the  main  text  is  repre- 
sented as  written  by  the  poet  Skelton,  who,  with  other 
notabilities  of  the  court  of  Henry  VIII,  rehearses  it  in 
view  of  an  approaching  performance  before  the  King. 
Thus,  casual  interpolations  in  Skeltonical  rime  and 
critical  discussions  between  the  actors  repeatedly  dis- 
pel the  illusion  necessary  to  the  main  story;  while  the 
audience  is  rather  unreasonably  required  to  connect 
with  each  of  the  important  figures  on  the  stage  two 
distinct  personalities  separated  by  three  centuries  and 
a  half.  At  one  moment  we  listen  to  the  opinions  of 
Skelton  and  Sir  John  Ellham,  while  the  next  instant 


.     274  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

we  must  associate  with  the  same  actors  the  words  of 
Friar  Tuck  and  Little  John. 

The  main  plot  of  the  "  Downfall "  is  greatly  confused. 
In  combining  the  romantic  theme  with  the  historical 
story  of  Prince  John's  tyrannies,  Munday  was  only 
following  the  example  set  by  Greene's  two  great  come- 
dies. It  is  hard,  however,  to  hold  the  author  excused, 
even  in  the  light  of  Tennyson's  similar  practice,  for  the 
tasteless  perversion  which  transforms  the  ideal  yeoman, 
Robin  Hood,  and  his  Maid  Marian  into  insipid  repre- 
sentations of  distressed  nobility.  Though  the  "Down- 
fall" shows  considerable  familiarity  with  the  stories  of 
such  popular  heroes  as  Robin  Hood  and  the  Pinner  of 
Wakefield,  the  greenwood  scenes  certainly  lack  as  a 
whole  the  charm  and  convincingness  of  atmosphere 
upon  which  the  appeal  of  romantic  comedy  is  mainly 
based.  Yet  this  first  of  Munday's  Robin  Hood  plays 
expresses  not  inadequately  the  cheery  optimism  of  the 
type,  and  it  even  contains  some  few  passages  which  are 
not  unworthy  of  having  influenced  the  nearly  contem- 
poraneous "As  You  Like  It."  *  Such,  for  example,  is 
the  pretty  scene  where  Robin  sleeps  on  a  green  bank 
with  Marian  strewing  flowers  upon  him,  while  Mari- 
an's exiled  and  famished  old  father,  Fitzwater,  enters, 
to  be  refreshed  and  comforted. 

The  second  Robin  Hood  play,  "The  Death  of  Robert, 
Earl  of  Huntington  .  .  .  with  the  lamentable  tragedy 
of  chaste  Matilda,  his  fair  Maid  Marian,  poisoned  at 
Dunmow  by  King  John,"  belongs  clearly  to  the  type 
of  history  play  rather  than  to  romantic  comedy.  How- 

1  See  A.  H.  Thorndike's  paper,  "The  Relation  of  As  You  Like  It 
to  Robin  Hood  Plays,"  Journal  of  Germanic  Philology,  iv  (1902), 
59-69. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     275 

ever,  it  was  both  produced  and  printed  in  the  same  year 
as  the  earlier  part,  with  which  it  is  closely  connected  by 
the  common  Skeltonical  framework  and  by  a  series 
of  prospective  and  retrospective  allusions.  The  main 
reason  for  the  striking  difference  between  the  two  parts 
is  doubtless  the  fact  that  the  guiding  hand  in  the  con- 
struction of  the  "Death"  was  not  Munday's,  but  that 
of  a  collaborator  of  very  different  taste;  namely,  Henry 
Chettle.  Chettle  was,  indeed,  paid  by  Henslowe  for 
revising  the  earlier  part  about  nine  months  after  its 
original  performance;  but  his  contributions  to  that 
play  do  not  appear  to  be  of  very  great  consequence  or 
easily  demonstrable.1  The  "Death,"  however,  every- 
where shows  the  light  atmosphere  of  pastoral  romance 
dissipated  by  the  incompatible  breath  of  gruesome  sen- 
sationalism which  marks  the  author  of  "Hoffman." 

The  "  Death "  has  no  pretence  to  unity.  The  actual 
story  of  Robin  ends  in  the  poisoning  of  that  hero  at 
about  the  close  of  the  first  quarter  of  the  play.  The  re- 
mainder is  a  confessed  excrescence,  carrying  on  the 
story  of  Matilda's  woes  and  the  sufferings  of  England 
under  John  in  a  manner  suggestive  of  the  most  lurid  of 
the  early  "histories."  The  precise  decision  concerning 
the  authorship  of  the  "Death"  is  obstructed  by  the 
fact  of  a  revision  subsequent  to  the  original  composi- 
tion, and  by  the  probably  intimate  relationship  of  the 
play  with  a  lost  "Funeral  of  Richard  Cceur  de  Lion" 
in  which  both  Chettle  and  Munday  collaborated  with 
two  other  employees  of  Henslowe.  It  seems  certain, 

1  The  Reverend  Ronald  Bayne  thinks  that  Chettle's  revision  of 
the  Downfall  "  clearly  consisted  of  the  induction  in  which  the  play  is 
set  and  the  Skeltonical  rimes,"  Cambridge  History  of  English  Litera- 
ture, v,  355. 


276  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

however,  that  the  earlier  scenes,  in  which  Robin  Hood 
still  appears,  belong  no  more  to  the  species  of  romantic 
comedy  than  do  the  entirely  non-pastoral  scenes  which 
follow.  Romantic  comedy  always  involves  the  tacit 
assumption  of  the  impossibility  of  a  tragic  conclusion 
and  always  emphasizes  atmosphere  rather  than  specific 
incident.  But  throughout  the  play  before  us  the  atten- 
tion is  held  almost  solely  by  spectacles  of  lurid  crime  or 
by  morbid  pictures  of  guilt  and  misery.  The  main 
"attractions"  of  the  opening  scenes  consist  in  the  per- 
fectly wanton  and  inartistic  assassination  of  Robin  and 
the  highly  colored  sketch  of  the  fiendish  diabolism  of 
Doncaster.  In  the  later,  more  historical  scenes,  the 
interest  is  concentrated  upon  similar  objects:  the 
hideous  passion  of  John,  hideously  portrayed ;  the 
Dantesque  death  of  Lady  Bruce  and  her  son,  starved 
in  Windsor  Tower;  the  pathetic  end  with  which  Ma- 
tilda meekly  closes  a  long  chapter  of  woes;  and  finally 
the  sensational  despair  and  suicide  of  John's  impious 
tool,  the  murderer  Brand. 

A  later  play,  greatly  superior  to  "Fair  Em"  and 
Munday's  comedies,  and  much  more  clearly  influenced 
by  Greene's  "Friar  Bacon,"  is  associated  with  "Fair 
Em"  by  an  absurd  ascription  to  Shakespeare.  "The 
Merry  Devil  of  Edmonton"  is  one  of  the  happiest  and 
most  artistic  among  the  minor  works  of  its  age.  Regis- 
tered for  publication  in  1607,  it  is  known  to  have  en- 
joyed marked  popularity  on  the  stage  three  years  ear- 
lier, and  was  presumably  composed  shortly  before  the 
end  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  —  a  dozen  years  after  the 
production  of  "Friar  Bacon."  The  two  prominent  at- 
tractions of  the  latter  work  —  the  figure  of  the  bene- 
volent conjurer  and  the  development  of  an  idyllic 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     277 

love  plot  among  the  surroundings  of  an  English  wood- 
land landscape  —  are  here  blended  with  a  good  deal 
more  harmony  than  in  Greene's  play;  and  they  are 
combined  with  a  humorously  sympathetic  portrayal  of 
bourgeois  types  which  owes  an  obvious  debt  to  Shake- 
speare's treatment  of  the  fraternity  of  Bottom.  "The 
Merry  Devil  of  Edmonton"  is  perhaps  the  best  roman- 
tic comedy  outside  of  Shakespeare.  This  play  shows 
how,  under  rare  favoring  conditions,  it  is  possible,  in 
spite  of  the  dicta  of  dramatic  theory,  to  make  truly 
effective  on  the  stage  the  poetic  treatment  of  a  fanci- 
ful love  story,  though  possessing  no  important  measure 
either  of  psychological  distinction  or  realistic  import. 
Some  of  the  happier  Elizabethans  succeeded  thus 
in  endowing  with  a  permanent  charm  their  responses 
to  that  irregular  theatrical  demand  which  again 
recently  has  enjoyed  a  brief  hour  of  purely  transitory 
acceptance  in  the  vogue  of  the  dramatized  romantic 
novel. 

"The  Merry  Devil  of  Edmonton  "  has  probably  only 
a  single  rival  among  the  non-Shakespearean  romantic 
comedies  of  its  decade.  That  it  finds  in  "The  Shoe- 
maker's Holiday  "  of  Dekker;  and  it  surpasses  Dekker's 
play  by  reason  of  its  superior  homogeneity.  "The 
Shoemaker's  Holiday,"  one  of  the  most  attractive 
Elizabethan  comedies,  is  also  one  of  the  most  difficult 
to  bring  into  conformity  with  the  rules  of  any  distinct 
dramatic  type.  Like  the  "Old  Fortunatus"  of  the 
same  poet,  it  is  based  upon  a  mixture  of  pseudo-his- 
torical, romantic,  and  realistic  elements,  which  will 
hardly  bear  analysis  or  separation. 

The  absorbing  interest  in  the  love  plot  of  "The  Merry 
Devil  of  Edmonton"  seems  to  have  prevented  the  in- 


278  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

troduction  of  the  magical  business  originally  contem- 
plated by  the  author.  The  first  scene,  indeed,  presents 
Fabell  as  a  conventional  mediaeval  sorcerer  lamenting 
in  lines  evidently  inspired  by  Marlowe  the  expiration 
of  his  compact  with  the  devil,  and  winning  seven  years' 
reprieve  only  by  cheating  the  spirit  that  seeks  his  soul. 
Fabell's  actual  services  to  the  lovers,  however,  never 
pass  the  bounds  of  natural  law;  and  the  total  impression 
of  his  figure  —  kindly,  confident,  and  charitably  wise 
—  is  rather  anticipatory  of  Prospero  than  reminiscent 
of  Faustus  or  Bacon.  The  main  story,  in  picturing  the 
triumph  of  youthful  love  over  the  designs  of  covetous 
parents,  gives  a  freshened  woodland  version  of  a  theme 
long  popular  with  the  imitators  of  Roman  comedy.  The 
bright  idealistic  treatment  of  English  sylvan  landscape 
reproduces  the  distinctive  tone  of  Greene,  who,  in- 
flamed with  the  general  patriotic  ardor  of  the  Armada 
era,  likes  always  to  make  his  pastoral  and  Utopian 
sketches  redound  to  the  credit  of  fair  England.  But  in 
the  portrayal  of  the  four  humorous  village  types,  the 
deer-stealers,  Smug,  Banks,  Blague,  and  Sir  John,  the 
author  of  the  "Merry  Devil"  has  added  a  not  inhar- 
monious note  of  kindly  realism  which  deepens  and 
humanizes  the  romantic  interest  in  a  manner  unknown 
to  Greene  and  peculiarly  characteristic  of  Shakespeare. 
The  slightly  anachronistic  device  of  the  convent  to 
which  the  heroine  is  sent  by  the  obstruction  in  the 
course  of  true  love,  and  from  which  the  timely  inter- 
vention of  her  chosen  suitor  rescues  her,  is  similar  to 
the  employment  of  the  same  stock  motive  in  Friar 
Bacon.  So,  too,  the  central  idea  of  the  generous  assist- 
ance of  the  less  favored  rival  in  effecting  the  lovers' 
happiness  is  a  rationalized  version  of  the  hackneyed 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     479 

theme  of  magnanimity  in  love,  which  forms  the  main 
plot  of  Lyly's  "Campaspe"  and  of  "Friar  Bacon," 
which  Peele  delicately  ridiculed  in  "The  Old  Wives' 
Tale,"  and  which  Shakespeare  reduced  to  absurdity  by 
his  unskilful  employment  in  the  last  act  of  "The  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona." 

Any  consideration  of  romantic  comedy  must  culmi- 
nate in  the  study  of  Shakespeare.  To  this  species,  which 
derived  from  the  pastoral  narrative  its  primary  view  of 
life,  belong  six  of  that  poet's  works,  —  two  of  the  earli- 
est period  ("The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona"  and  "A 
Midsummer-Night's  Dream  ") ;  two  comedies  of  middle 
life  ("As  You  Like  It"  and  "Twelfth  Night");  and 
two  of  his  latest  performances  ("The  Winter's  Tale" 
and  "The  Tempest");  while  "Cymbeline,"  "The 
Merchant  of  Venice,"  and  the  genuine  portion  of 
"Pericles"  display  very  considerable  traces  of  the 
same  influence. 

The  significance  and  distinct  character  of  the  strain 
of  idealistic  fancy  which  thus  manifests  itself  inter- 
mittently through  the  entire  life-work  of  Shakespeare 
have  seldom  been  adequately  stressed  in  appreciations 
either  of  the  individual  poet  or  of  his  dramatic  milieu. 
The  romantic  comedies  just  mentioned  are  the  most 
notable  manifestations  during  the  period  extending 
from  Greene's  death  to  Shakespeare's  retirement  (1592- 
1612)  of  the  centrifugal  tendency  indispensable  to  the 
preservation  of  the  balance  of  poetry  against  the  in- 
creasingly powerful  local  and  introspective  bent  of  the 
time.  It  is  greatly  to  be  deplored  that  the  undiscrim- 
inating  extension  of  the  Elizabethan  title  to  the  litera- 
ture of  the  earlier  Stuart  reigns  has  led  to  a  general 
ignoring  of  the  radical  difference  in  tone  between  the 


280  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

work  of  the  early  seventeenth  century  and  that  of  the 
final  quarter  of  the  sixteenth. 

The  truth  is  that  the  last  of  the  "Elizabethans"  was 
not  Shirley,  but  Shakespeare.  The  gulf  which  the  ac- 
cident of  history  created  between  the  age  of  Charles  I 
and  that  of  Dryden  separates  far  less  opposed  concep- 
tions of  life  and  art  than  that,  centring  about  1603, 
which  distinguishes  the  prevailingly  idealistic  attitude 
represented  by  the  "Faery  Queene"  and  "Shepherds' 
Calendar,"  "Tamburlaine,"  "A  Midsummer-Night's 
Dream,"  and  the  "Arcadia"  from  the  predominant 
self-concern  of  the  most  characteristic  productions  of 
the  next  generation,  —  Jonson's  and  Middleton's  real- 
istic comedies  and  Donne's  metaphysical  poems.  The 
genuine  Elizabethan  spirit  passed  with  the  passing  of 
the  peculiar  imaginative  exhilaration  and  the  substi- 
tution of  the  microscopic  treatment  of  contemporary 
whims  and  trifles  for  the  earlier  ambition  to  body  forth 
"the  forms  of  things  unknown." 

Shakespeare  nowhere  shows  himself  the  friend  of 
uncompromising  realism.  All  his  sketches  of  common 
life,  though  brilliantly  accurate,  are  both  universalized  v 
and  interpreted  by  their  romantic  setting.  Moreover, 
in  the  six  comedies  particularly  enumerated  above,  he 
puts  himself  into  direct  and  —  in  the  case  of  the  later 
examples,  at  least  —  into  conscious  opposition  to  the 
practical  trend  of  the  day,  appealing  almost  solely  to 
the  fancy,  and  ignoring  the  realities  and  probabilities 
of  the  humdrum  world  to  an  extent  unequalled  perhaps 
in  any  other  successful  stage  play.  Three  of  these  com- 
edies —  "The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona,"  "As  You 
Like  It,"  and  "The  Winter's  Tale  " — are  strict  drama- 
tizations of  pastoral  romance,  while  "Twelfth  Night" 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     281 

comes  partly  from  the  same  source.  The  other  two  are, 
significantly,  the  happiest  and  most  enthusiastic  of 
Shakespeare's  efforts  at  original  plot  construction.  It 
is  probably  no  accident  that  in  this  group  of  comedies 
also  we  approach  closest  to  Shakespeare's  individual 
self  and  find  his  most  personal  observations  on  the 
great  problems  of  life  and  death,  on  love  and  marriage, 
poetry,  music,  and  the  world.  Here,  far  more  truly 
than  in  the  sonnets  or  the  great  tragedies,  Shakespeare 
unlocked  his  heart;  and  the  dramatic  irregularities  of 
this  group  of  plays,  often  slighted  or  slurred  over,  indi- 
cate, not  carelessness  simply,  but  hardened  preference 
and  reason. 

The  two  distinguishing  features  of  this  set  of  come- 
dies —  features  inherited  from  the  pastoral  novel  and 
accentuated  rather  than  reduced  by  Shakespeare  — 
are  the  absence  of  the  fundamental  dramatic  conflict 
which  forms  regularly  the  backbone  both  of  comedy 
and  tragedy,  and  the  removal  of  practical  logic  from 
the  control  of  character  and  emotion.  Most  of  the  pas- 
sions in  these  plays  are  of  like  nature  with  the  childish 
affection  described  in  "The  Two  Noble  Kinsmen"  (I, 
iii,  69-74) :  — 

"  But  I 

And  she  I  sigh  and  spoke  of  were  things  innocent, 
Lou'd  for  we  did,  and  like  the  Elements 
That  know  not  what,  nor  why,  yet  doe  effect 
Rare  issues  by  their  operancc,  our  soules 
Did  so  to  one  another  !  " 

To  compare  such  works  with  comedies  of  intrigue 
and  character  conflict,  like  "Much  Ado  About  No- 
thing," "The  Taming  of  the  Shrew,"  "Measure  for 
Measure,"  or  even  with  slightly  more  idealized  speci- 


^        r    "  V 

v     Y          ,  v 

282  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

** 
'  mens  such  as  "The  Merchant  of  Venice"  and  "All  'g 

Well  that  Ends  Well";  or  to  group  all  together  in  the 
same  general  category  that  includes  also  the  produc- 
tions of  Congreve,  Goldsmith,  and  Sheridan,  is  to  sub- 
mit those  we  are  considering  to  false  and  impossible 
standards  of  judgment  and  totally  to  misapprehend 
the  author's  aim  and  method. 

"The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  "  is  an  experimental 
early  work  hardly  meriting  special  attention  except  for 
the  promise  of  broad  sympathy  in  the  scene  which 
brings  together  and  contrasts  the  emotions  of  Proteus 
and  Silvia,  the  host,  and  the  disguised  Julia.1  "A 
Midsummer-Night's  Dream"  shows  itself,  indeed,  an 
accomplished  masterpiece  in  its  development  of  a 
somewhat  frivolous  plot  and  in  its  treatment  of  the 
fairy  machinery  and  the  bourgeois  types.  The  han- 
dling of  the  romantic  figures  remains,  however,  vague 
and  hazy,  the  most  notable  advance  appearing  in  the 
superior  distinctness  of  the  pair  of  heroines  when  con- 
trasted with  those  in  "The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona," 
and  the  ability  to  portray  in  Theseus  a  convincingly 
•'  noble  gentleman. 

The  other  comedies  of  the  class  all  belong,  however, 
to  the  period  of  maturity,  and  all  contain  characters 
which  rank  among  the  most  memorable  and  beloved 
in  Shakespeare.  Such  are  the  figures  of  the  four  hero- 
ines, Rosalind,  Viola,  Perdita,  and  Miranda,  together 
with  the  closely  related  Imogen  and  Marina  of  "Cym- 
beline"  and  "Pericles"  respectively,  and  the  diverse 
male  trio:  Touchstone,  Prospero,  and  Jaques.  Any 
comparison  of  these  characters  with  the  principal  per- 

1  Act  IV,  scene  4.  For  an  admirable  appreciation  of  this  scene, 
«ee  Professor  Dowden,  Shakspere'a  Mind  and  Art,  ed.  1901,  344, 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     283 

sons  of  the  other  great  dramas  of  Shakespeare  —  with 
Shylock,  FaLstaff,  lago,  Hamlet,  Lear,  Benedick,  Bea- 
trice, or  Isabella,  for  example  —  will  show  what  re- 
strictions must  be  made  before  the  former  can  be  justly 
praised  for  their  truth  to  life  or  their  illustration  of 
human  psychology.  Shakespeare  has  nowhere  por- 
trayed with  more  delicate  intuition  the  beauty  and 
nobility  of  which  mortal  man  is  capable  than  hi  the 
great  figures  of  these  romantic  comedies;  but  he  di- 
verges from  his  usual  practice  in  showing  character 
static  rather  than  progressive,  —  in  working,  as  it  were, 
in  the  midst  of  a  vacuum,  and  creating  his  Rosalind  and 
Orlando,  Prospero  and  Miranda  full-grown,  instead  of 
letting  them  evolve  their  own  character  out  of  the  mesh 
of  circumstance  and  the  cross  purposes  of  worldly  en- 
vironment. The  comedies  dating  from  the  close  of  the 
century  present  in  Rosalind,  Celia,  Orlando,  Olivia,  Or- 
sino,  and  Viola  rather  etherealized  human  beings  in  an 
imaginary  setting.  The  last  plays  go  farther  and  peo- 
ple a  more  fanciful  world  with  hauntingly  exquisite 
dream  figures  incapable  of  life  on  any  earth  we  know. 
In  the  rarefied  air  of  these  plays  individual  respon- 
sibility, the  sheet-anchor  of  ordinary  dramatic  art, 
weighs  very  light.  The  early  comedies,  "The  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona"  and  "A  Midsummer-Night's 
Dream,"  had  dealt  trivially  with  unpunished  infideli- 
ties and  impossible  revolutions  in  love.  "As  You  Like 
It"  shows  us  the  villain  Oliver  assuming  in  a  trice  the 
role  of  happy  lover  and  the  wicked  Duke  Frederick 
turning  hermit  at  a  word ;  while  in  the  last  plays  the 
easy  contemptuous  pardon  of  Alonzo,  Sebastian,  and 
the  odious  Leontes  leaves  the  reader  thirsting  for 
poetic  justice.  There  is  more  in  all  this  than  that  care- 


284  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

lessness  or  indifference,  which  occasionally,  as  for  exam- 
ple in  "Measure  for  Measure,"  leads  the  poet  to  juggle 
with  the  strict  balance  of  debit  and  credit  in  the  in- 
terest of  a  harmonious  conclusion. 

The  pastoral  novelists  had  intentionally  laid  the  scene 
of  their  romances  in  Utopia;  and  Shakespeare,  in  the 
plays  which  he  developed  in  their  manner,  steadily 
heightened  the  gracious  unreality  of  the  setting.  The 
result  is  that  lofty  serenity  and  unworldliness  which 
animate  the  last  plays  and  make  them  appeal  forever 
less  as  dramatic  pictures  of  life  than  as  the  ultimate 
achievements  in  high  romance.  But  out  of  the  special 
excellences  of  this  type  of  play  there  arise  as  inevitable 
corollaries  certain  limitations.  The  supreme  dramatist 
of  the  world  can  develop  human  character  as  it  is  known 
to  us  only  out  of  the  causes  which  in  actual  life  evince 
it :  the  sublunary  conflicts  of  worldling  with  worldling, 
and  the  action  upon  the  individual  of  the  tangled  web 
of  mundane  duty  and  aspiration.  The  presentation  of 
such  conditions  would  be  repugnant,  of  course,  to  the 
idyllic  environment  in  which  move  the  main  figures  of 
"As  You  Like  It"  and  "Twelfth  Night";  any  attempt 
at  it  would  be  totally  subversive  of  the  still  rarer, 
vaguer  atmosphere  of  "The  Winter's  Tale"  and  "The 
Tempest,"  —  and  this  Shakespeare  has  understood 
better  than  his  critics.  The  difference  between  Perdita 
and  such  creatures  of  the  real  world  as  Beatrice  and 
Desdemona  is  the  difference  between  inspired  and  re- 
vealed psychology.  It  would,  perhaps,  be  difficult  to 
decide  which  type  is  the  more  beautiful;  but  the  whole 
history  of  drama  shows  the  former  to  be  infinitely 
harder  of  presentation.  Even  in  Shakespeare's  treat- 
ment, subordinate  characters  like  Celia  and  Olivia  — 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     285 

much  more,  Oliver  and  Sebastian  —  fare  somewhat 
badly  on  a  stage  which  permits  little  use  of  the  minuiia 
of  realistic  differentiation.  And  it  is  natural  also  that 
the  portraits  of  the  heroines,  where  the  delineation  of 
mere  mood  and  quiescent  character  can  be  made  most 
effective,  succeed  better  in  general  than  those  of  the 
heroes  (Orlando,  Orsino,  Florizel,  and  Ferdinand)  from 
whom  the  reader  is  inclined  to  demand  more  concrete 
exhibitions  of  energy  and  action. 

To  infer  a  radical  incompatibility  between  the  charm- 
ing unreality  of  these  romantic  comedies  and  the 
searching  psychological  analyses  which  his  other  great 
dramas  present  would  indicate  a  misconception  of 
Shakespeare's  genius  only  second  to  that  involved  in 
the  confusion  of  all  under  the  same  arbitrary  definition. 
The  creation  of  a  universe  of  visionary  loveliness  where 
nobly  ideal  figures  move  freely  and  happily,  relieved 
from  the  constraint  and  compromise  of  actual  society, 
was  the  necessary  correlative  in  a  well-poised  imagina- 
tion to  that  close  study  of  human  souls  in  the  toils 
of  circumstance  to  which  the  tragedies  and  more  serious 
comedies  testify.  Rosalind  and  Viola  belong  to  the 
same  period,  temporally  and  spiritually,  with  Brutus 
and  Portia,  Hero,  Don  John,  and  Troilus.  So,  too,  the 
heightened  unworldliness  of  the  great  figures  in  "The 
Winter's  Tale,"  "The  Tempest,"  and  "Cymbeline" 
is  the  natural  complement  and  corrective  of  the  pain- 
fully intense  absorption  in  real  life  and  real  character 
which  produced  the  immediately  antecedent  burst  of 
tragedy.  This  power  of  refreshing  the  fancy  in  the  realm 
of  beautiful  impossibilities  was  the  quality  which  kept 
sweet  Shakespeare's  judgments  of  the  actual  world.  ; 
Not  only  are  the  romantic  plays  indispensable  to  a 


280  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

properly  rounded  appreciation  of  the  poet's  genius; 
they  even  offer  the -necessary  explanation  of  the  broad 
impartial  wisdom  and  permanent  truth  of  his  deepest 
probings  into  character.  It  was  the  possession  of  the 
vein  of  pure  fancy  to  which  Shakespeare  gives  unre- 
strained scope  in  his  valedictory  works  of  "The 
Winter's  Tale"  and  "The  Tempest,"  that  raises  the 
complex  psychological  demonstrations  of  "Hamlet," 
"Lear,"  "Othello,"  and  "Macbeth"  high  above  the 
level  of  contemporary  realism.  Just  so,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  accuracy  of  his  impressionistic,  inductive 
sketches  of  Rosalind  and  Miranda  is  solely  the  result 
of  the  careful  analyses  of  actual  psychic  conditions 
evidenced,  for  example,  in  the  characterization  of  Bea- 
trice and  Benedick  or  the  portrayal  of  Cordelia's  re- 
finement by  suffering.  Thus,  the  fact  that  Shakespeare 
has  ventured,  in  the  four  mature  plays  which  I  have 
been  especially  considering,  to  depict  on  the  stage  more 
purely  fanciful  beings  and  circumstances  than  any 
other  dramatist  has  ever  successfully  presented,  instead 
of  being  exceptional  or  surprising,  is  the  direct  conse- 
quence of  his  portrayal  elsewhere  of  the  most  searching 
studies  of  human  character  known  to  literature.  The 
unsoured  and  unflinching  exposition  of  the  ruin  of  noble 
natures  like  Brutus,  Hamlet,  Othello,  Lear,  and  Mac- 
beth before  the  insidious  and  all-testing  contact  of  the 
world  was  possible  only  to  a  disposition  rich  and  sensi- 
tive enough  to  find  relief  in  a  balancing  world  of  fancy, 
where  perfect  beauty  might  flourish  without  the  pains 
of  evolution,  and  nobility  expand  itself  without  conflict. 
One  deep  mark  the  poet's  sad  experience  of  life, 
recorded  by  the  tragedies  and  dark  comedies,  left  upon 
his  romantic  plays  in  the  increasing  perception  of  the 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     287 

essential  impossibility  of  the  dream  world  which  the 
latter  picture.  The  Arcadian  environment,  which  in 
"The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona"  and  "A  Midsummer 
Night's  Dream"  is  hardly  distinguished  consciously 
from  reality,  and  which  "  As  You  Like  It "  and  "  Twelfth 
Night "  present  with  cheerful  conviction,  is  in  the  last 
plays  removed  to  the  domain  of  the  confessedly  unreal 
by  the  wistfulness  of  its  treatment  and  the  blackness  of 
the  actual  world  against  which  it  is  opposed.  On  a 
stage  which  had  already  descended  far  toward  crass 
sensationalism  on  the  one  hand  and  morbid  realism  on 
the  other,  "The  Tempest"  appeared  as  the  last  strong 
protest  of  the  earlier  idealism,  and  it  has  good  claim 
to  be  regarded  as  the  final  genuine  expression  of  the 
proper  Elizabethan  spirit. 

Few  terms  or  definitions  can  be  made  to  hold  good 
unreservedly  for  Shakespeare.  The  idyllic  atmosphere 
inherited  from  pastoral  romance  inspires  scenes  of 
many  of  the  plays  not  here  specifically  considered, 
refining  their  effects  and  giving  them  a  charm  not  born 
of  realistic  accuracy.  So,  again,  in  the  six  romantic 
comedies,  par  excellence,  the  poet  does  not  altogether 
lose  touch  with  the  standards  and  interests  of  the  outer 
world.  The  mingling  of  realism  and  romance  is  most 
evenly  carried  out  in  "Twelfth  Night."  Here,  behind 
the  Illyrian  landscape  and  the  figures  of  Viola,  Olivia, 
Orsino,  and  Sebastian,  there  appears  a  solid  English 
background  upon  which  Shakespeare  repeats  in  Sir 
Toby  and  Aguecheek  the  sturdy  mundane  comedy  of 
Falstaff  and  Slender,  and  piques  on  Malvolio  his  spite 
against  militant  Puritanism  very  much  as  in  "  Hamlet " 
he  uses  the  stage  of  Denmark  to  unburden  himself 
concerning  current  theatrical  disputes.  In  "Twelfth 


288  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Night"  the  two  worlds  are  very  clearly  distinguished. 
The  realistic  scenes  appear  through  the  filmy  main- 
plot  like  actual  figures  behind  a  painted  tissue  curtain. 
The  two  atmospheres,  constantly  contiguous,  can  never 
be  said  to  blend.  And  this  necessity  of  defining  the 
real  from  the  unreal  accounts  largely  for  the  absence 
of  responsibility  and  retribution  in  romantic  comedy. 
Sir  Toby  is  too  full-bodied  a  sinner  to  be  punished  for 
his  breaches  of  Illyrian  etiquette;  and  the  dainty,  vi- 
sionary setting  of  "As  You  Like  It"  and  "The  Tem- 
pest" would  never  bear  too  heavy  a  stress  on  the 
worldly  depravity  of  Oliver,  Alonzo,  or  Antonio. 

After  Shakespeare,  the  dramatic  imitation  of  pasto- 
ral romance  became  a  dead  convention  maintained  for 
the  most  part  by  the  weaker  poets  and  productive  of 
the  cheapest  melodramatic  effects.  The  freshness  of  tone 
which  lends  this  type  of  drama  its  distinctive  charm 
in  the  true  Elizabethan  examples  had  small  place  in  the 
intellectual  endowment  of  the  Stuart  playwrights.  One 
may  well  feel  it  ground  for  congratulation  that  the 
limits  of  this  work  remove  the  necessity  of  tracing  the 
line  of  anticlimax  through  the  various  paltry  plagiarisms 
from  Sidney's  "Arcadia"  and  Greene's  "Menaphon," 
which  commenced  with  Day's  "Isle  of  Gulls"  (1605) 
and  ended  with  the  flotsam  and  jetsam  published  after 
the  Restoration  or  left  to  moulder  in  manuscript.1 

The  Italian  pastoral  drama  of  such  writers  as  Tasso 
and  Guarini  was,  during  the  strict  Elizabethan  period, 
far  less  important  as  a  dramatic  source  than  the  prose 
romance.  The  Italian  dramatic  pastoral  is  variously 

1  An  excellent  discussion  of  this  subject  will  be  found  in  W.  W. 
Greg's  Pastoral  Poetry  and  Pastoral  Drama. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     280 

reckoned  to  date  from  the  appearance  of  the  "  Favola 
d'Orfeo"  of  Agnolo  Poliziano,  acted  at  the  Mantuan 
court  in  1471,  and  from  Agostino  Beccari's  stricter 
representative  of  the  type  in  "II  Sacrifizio,"  first  pro- 
duced at  Ferrara  in  1554.  The  full  possibilities  of  the 
species  were  manifested  in  the  "Aminta,"  written  in 
1572-1573  byTorquatoTasso,  then  twenty-eight  years 
of  age,  and  printed  in  1581.  An  English  translation  by 
Abraham  Frauncewas  published  in  "The  Countess  of 
Pembroke's  Ivy-Church"  a  decade  later  (1591).  The 
chief  rival  of  Tasso  in  this  branch  of  art  was  a  fellow 
courtier,  Battista  Guarini,  whose  "Pastor  Fido"  ap- 
peared in  1590,  having  been  completed  and  probably 
acted  in  1585.  In  1591,  this  play  and  the  "Aminta" 
were  both  published  in  the  original  Italian  by  John 
Wolfe  for  the  benefit  of  London  readers,  and  in  1602 
an  English  version  of  the  former  was  dedicated  by  an 
unknown  translator  to  Sir  Edward  Dymock. 

The  "Pastor  Fido"  is  a  much  longer,  more  com- 
plex, and  even  more  artificial  production  than  Tasso *s 
"Aminta";  and  it  must  be  regarded  as  considerably 
inferior  to  the  latter,  though  its  elaborate  development 
of  the  machinery  of  mistaken  identity,  mysterious 
prophecy,  and  laws  and  counter-laws  against  lovers 
made  it  for  later  writers  a  sort  of  compendium  and 
model  of  pastoral  intrigue.  The  execution  of  the 
"Aminta"  is  simple  and  beautiful.  There  is  little  true 
dramatic  action,  and  the  characters  are  conceived  in 
the  silly  and  prurient  tone  of  the  Latin  "golden  age" 
tradition.  However,  Tasso's  piece  is  saved  from  coarse- 
ness  by  its  grace  and  from  mawkishness  by  the  presence 
of  a  true  and  delicate  sense  of  humor.  The  final  chorus 
of  the  play,  which  I  quote  in  Leigh  Hunt's  admirable 


290  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

translation,  repeats  with  almost  the  gracious  irony  of 
Chaucer  himself  the  touch  by  which  that  master  of 
raillery  tempers  the  excess  of  sentiment  in  his  "Clerk's 
Tale":  — 

"  I  know  not  whether  all  the  bitter  toil, 

With  which  this  lover  to  his  purpose  kept, 

And  served,  and  loved,  and  sighed,  and  wept, 

Can  give  a  perfect  taste 

To  any  sweet  soever  at  the  last: 

But  if  indeed  the  joy 

Come  dearer  from  annoy, 

I  ask  not,  Love,  for  my  delight 

To  reach  that  beatific  height: 

Let  others  have  that  perfect  cup: 

Me  let  my  mistress  gather  up 

To  the  heart  where  I  would  cling, 

After  short  petitioning."  1 

It  may  possibly  be  debated  whether  the  earliest 
English  examples  of  pastoral  comedy,  plays  of  Latin 
influence  like  "Gallathea"  and  "The  Arraignment  of 
Paris,"  owe  a  subsidiary  debt  to  Tasso.  In  any  case 
they  cannot  owe  a  great  deal.  The  general  introduc- 
tion of  the  Italian  pastoral  play  —  always  a  courtly 
type  —  was  due  to  the  same  group  of  literary  exquisites 
who  attempted  the  establishment  of  another  aristo- 
cratic species  in  their  imitations  of  Garnier's  tragedy. 
The  translation  of  the  "  Aminta"  in  a  volume  inscribed 
to  the  Countess  of  Pembroke  has  been  mentioned,  and 
the  first  original  English  experiments  in  the  same  genre 
were  the  work  of  the  most  gifted  of  Lady  Pembroke's 
followers,  Samuel  Daniel.  All  of  these  comedies  fall 
without  the  limits  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  and  few  of 
them  deserve  on  their  own  account  more  than  passing 
1  Amyntaa,  A  Tale  of  the  Woods,  trans.  Leigh  Hunt. 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     891 

notice.  Daniel's  first  effort  in  the  pastoral  style  was 
published  in  1606  with  the  title:  "The  Queenes  Arcadia, 
A  Pastorall  Trage-comedie  presented  to  her  Maiestie 
and  her  Ladies,  by  the  Vniuersitie  of  Oxford  in  Christs 
Church,  in  August  last,  1605."  The  play  deals  in  a 
somewhat  original,  if  cumbrous,  way  with  the  disorder 
produced  in  an  Arcadian  shepherd  community  by  the 
wiles  of  two  types  of  worldly  corruption,  Colax  and 
Techne.  With  the  usual  pastoral  machinery  is  com- 
bined some  not  quite  contemptible  Jonsonian  comedy, 
notably  in  the  speeches  of  Dr.  Alcon,  the  Quacksalver, 
who  addresses  the  shepherdess  Daphne  in  the  following 
travesty  of  medical  and  alchemistic  language:  — 

"  Welcome,  faire  nim ph.  come  let  me  try  your  pulse. 
I  cannot  blame  you  t'  hold  your  selfe  not  well. 
Something  amiss,  quoth  you,  here  's  all  amiss, 
Th'  whole  Fabrick  of  your  selfe  distempered  is, 
The  Systole,  and  Dyastole  of  your  pulse, 
Do  shew  your  passions  most  hysterical). 
It  seemes  you  haue  not  very  careful  bene 
T'  observe  the  prophilactick  regiment 
Of  your  own  body,  so  that  we  must  now 
Descend  vnto  the  Therapeutical 
That  so  we  may  preuent  the  syndrome 
Of  symtomes,  and  may  afterwards  apply 
Some  unalrpt it-all  Elexipharmacum, 
That  may  be  proper  for  your  maladie." 

Daniel's  second  and  last  effort  in  emulation  of  the 
Italian  pastoral  play  is  "Hymen's  Triumph,"  acted  at 
court  in  1614,  and  published  in  the  following  year.  This 
work,  considerably  simpler  and  more  original  than  the 
former,  brings  us  well  into  the  middle  of  the  Jacobean 
period  and  directs  the  attention  to  the  more  independ- 
ent shepherd  plays  of  this  e|)och.  Of  the  last,  only 


292  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

two  justify  mention  here  as  obvious  survivals  of  an 
earlier  spirit.  In  "The  Faithful  Shepherdess"  (1609), 
Fletcher  has  reproduced  the  thin  and  bloodless  pasto- 
ral world  of  Guarini  with  a  freshness  which  gives  the 
play  much  of  the  delicacy,  though  nothing  of  the  sweet 
charm,  of  the  Elizabethan  romantic  comedies.  In  his 
beautiful  fragment  of  "The  Sad  Shepherd  "  Ben  Jon- 
son  has  proposed  with  a  Titanic  daring,  which  piques 
the  curiosity  and  again  suggests  the  warmer  earlier  era, 
to  blend  the  abstract  types  of  Italian  pastoralism  with 
the  red-blood  figures  of  Robin  Hood  romance.  Jonson's 
torso,  however,  is  more  in  the  nature  of  an  untried 
enterprise  than  a  dramatic  achievement;  and  it  must 
always,  perhaps,  have  shown  more  kinship  with  the 
masque  than  with  convincing  human  drama.  "The 
Faithful  Shepherdess,"  for  all  its  beauty,  was  a  noto- 
rious failure;  and  lacking  warmth  of  feeling  as  it  does, 
would  be  so  on  any  stage.  The  other  plays  of  the  same 
type,  not  infrequent  in  the  first  two  Stuart  reigns,  are 
one  and  all  devoid  of  dramatic  life.  They  are  the  hard 
and  cold  crystallizations  from  a  gradually  petrifying 
drama  of  that  fervent  ideality  which  informed  all  the 
most  characteristic  Elizabethan  works,  and  produced, 
not  merely  the  distinctively  romantic  comedies,  but 
also  the  charming  shepherd  scenes  scattered  like  oases 
in  the  midst  of  plays  otherwise  filled  with  the  crash  of 
matter  and  the  wreck  of  worlds. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

GENERAL    DISCUSSION 

Sreg,  W.  W.,  Pastoral  Poetry  and  Pastoral  Drama.  A   Liter- 
ary Inquiry  with  special  Reference  to  the  Pre-Restoration  Stage 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     999 

in  England,  1906.    Elaborated  from  "  The  Pastoral  Drama 

on  the  Elizabethan  Stage,"  ComhiU  Magazine,  1899. 
Koeppel,  I!.,  Studien  zur  Geschichte  der  italienitcken  Novell*  ii 

der  englischen   Litteratur  des   16  Jahrhunderts,   Quellen   tmd 

Forschungen,  Ixx,  1892. 
Laidler,  Josephine,  "  A  History  of  Pastoral  Drama  in  England 

until  1700,"  Engl.  Stud.,  xxxv  (1905),  193-259. 
Smith,  Homer,  "  Pastoral  Influence  in  the  English  Drama," 

Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  As*oc.,  1897. 
Thorndike,  A.   H.,    "The  Pastoral  Element  in  the  English 

Drama  before  1605,"  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xiv  (1900). 

INDIVIDUAL   TEXTS 

GREENE,  ROBERT  :  Dramatic  Works,  edited  by  A.  Dyee,  1831, 
1861,  1879  ;  A.  B.  Grosart,  1881-86  ;  J.  C.  Collins,  1905; 
T.  H.  Dickinson,  Mermaid  edition,  1909. 
Friar  Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay .    "  As  it  was  plaid  by  her 
Maiesties   seruants.    Made  by  Robert  Greene  Maister  of 
Arts,"  1594.  Other  editions  1599  ?,  1630,  1655.  Reprinted, 
J.  P.  Collier,  Dodsley,  viii,  1825;  A.  W.  Ward,  Old  English 
Drama  (with  Doctor  Faustus),  1878,  etc.;  C.  M.  Gayley,  Rep- 
resentative English  Comedies,  1903. 

The  Scottish  History  of  James  the  Fourth,  slain  at 
Flodden.  "  Written  by  Robert  Greene,  Maister  of  Arts," 
1598.  Reprinted,  J.  M.  Manly,  Specimens,  ii,  1897.  Discus- 
sion: W.  Creizenach,  "Zu  Greene's  James  the  Fourth,"  An- 
glia,  viii  (1885),  419. 

(Spurious)  George  a  Greene,  the  Pinner  of  Wakefield, 
1590.    Reprinted,  Reed's   and   Collier's  Dodsley;    Ancient 
British  Drama,  i,  1810.    Discussion :  O.  Merlins,  "  Robert 
Greene  uud  '  the  play  of  George-a-Greene,  the  Pinner  of 
Wakefield,'  "  1885  ;  R.  Sachs,  "  George  Green,  the  Pinner 
of  Wakefield,"  Sh.  Jb.,  xxvii  (1892),  192  ff. 
Fair  Em,  the  Miller's  Daughter  of  Manchester.    "With 
the  lone  of  William  the  Conqueror.  As  it  was  sundrie  times 
publiquely   acted  ...  by  the    right    honourable    the    Ixml 
Strange  his  seruaunts."  Ed.  n.  d.  Reprinted  1631.  Later  edi- 
tions :  W.  R.  Chetwood,  Select  Collection  of  Old  Plays,  1750  ; 
II.  Tyrrell,  1851  ;    N.   Delius,   1874  ;   R.  Simpson,  School  of 
?,  ii,   1878;  C.   Warnko  and  L.   Proeacholdt,  1883 ; 


294  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

A.  F.  Hopkinson,  1895  ;  C.  F.  T.  Brooke,  The  Shakespeare 
Apocrypha,  1908.  For  discussion,  see  bibliography  to  The 
Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 

MUNDAY,  ANTHONY  :  John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber.  Pre- 
served in  manuscript  signed  by  Munday  and  dated  "  Decenv 
bris,  1595."  Printed,  J.  P.  Collier,  Shakespeare  Society,  1851. 
The  Downfall  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Huntingdon,  "After- 
ward called  Robin  Hood  of  merrie  Sherwodde  with  his  loue 
to  chaste  Matilda,  the  Lord  Fitz waters  daughter  afterward  es 
his  faire  Maide  Marian.  Acted  by  the  Right  Honourable  the 
Earle  of  Notingham,  Lord  high  Admirall  of  England,  his 
seruants,"  1601.  Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier,  1828. 
The  Death  of  Robert,  Earl  of  Huntington  ..."  with  the 
lamentable  Tragedie  of  chaste  Matilda,  his  faire  maide 
Marian,  poysoned  at  Dunmowe  by  King  lohn."  Acted  by 
the  Admiral's  Servants,  1601.  Both  these  plays  are  re- 
printed in  J.  P.  Collier's  Five  Old  Plays,  1833,  and  thence 
in  Hazlitt's  Dodsley,  viii,  1874.  Henry  Chettle  was  respon- 
sible for  a  revision  of  the  earlier  drama,  and  was  part 
author  of  the  later.  Discussion :  A.  Ruckdeschel,  Die  Quel- 
len  des  Dramas  "  The  Downfall  and  the  Death  of  Robert,  Earl 
of  Huntington,"  Erlangeu,  1897  ;  A.  H.  Thorudike,  "  The 
Relation  of  As  You  Like  It  to  the  Robin  Hood  Plays,"  Jrl. 
Germ.  Phil.,  iv  (1902),  59-69. 

The  Merry  Devil  of  Edmonton.  "  As  it  hath  beene  sundry 
times  Acted  by  his  Maiesties  Seruants,  at  the  Globe,  on  the 
banke-side,"  1608.  Other  editions  1612, 1617, 1626, 1631, 1655. 
Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  edd.;  Ancient  British  Drama,  1810;  H. 
Tyrrell,  1851;  K.  Warnke  and  L.  Proescholdt,  1884  ;  A.  F. 
Hopkinson,  1891;  H.  Walker,  Temple  Dramatists,  1897;  C. 
F.  T.  Brooke,  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha,  1908.  For  discus- 
sion, see  bibliography  to  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 
DEKKER,  THOMAS  :  Old  Fortunatus,  1600. 
The  Shoemaker's  Holiday,  1600. 

For  bibliography  of  these  plays,  see  p.  350. 

The  Thracian  Wonder.  First  printed  by  Francis  Kirkman  in  a 
volume  entitled  Two  New  Playes,  1661,  and  there  stated  to  be 
"  Written  by  John  Webster  and  William  Rowley."  Reprinted, 
Works  of  John  Webster,  A.  Dyce  iv,  1830  ;  W.  Hazlitt,  iv, 
1897.  Discussion:  J.  Q.  Adams,  Jr.,  Mod.  Phil.,  Hi  (1900); 


ROMANTIC  AND  PASTORAL  COMEDY     295 

J.  Le  Gay  Brereton,  Engl.  Stud.,  ixxvii  (1907)  ;  Afod.  Lang. 
Review,  ii  (1906),  reprinted  in  "  Elizabethan  Drama,  Notes 
and  Studies,"  1909. 

The  Weakest  Goeth  to  the  Wall,  1600.  Another  edition, 
1618.  Reprinted,  W.  Hazlitt,  Dramatic  Works  of  John  Web- 
ster, vol.  iv,  1897. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM  :  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona. 
First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 

A  Midsummer-Night's  Dream,  1600  (printed  for  Thomas 
Fisber).  Reprinted  for  James  Roberts  (in  1619?)  with  the 
fraudulent  date,  1600. 

The  Merchant  of  Venice.  "  J.  R.  for  Thomas  Heyes,"  1600. 
Reprinted  (in  1619?),  J.  Roberts,  with  fraudulent  date,  1600. 
As   You   Like   It.    First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 
Twelth  Night.  "          "          "    "       "         " 

Cymbeline.  "          "          "    "       "         " 

The  Winter's  Tale.     "          "          "    "       "         " 
The  Tempest.  "          "          "    "       "         " 

Pericles,  Prince  of  Tyre,  "  With  the  true  Relation  of  the 
whole  Historic,  aduentures,  and  fortunes  of  the  said  Prince 
...  As  it  hath  been  diners  and  sundry  times  acted  by  his 
Maiesties  Seruauts,  at  the  Globe  'on  the  Banck-side.  By 
William  Shakespeare,"  1609  (two  issues),  1611,  1619,  1630 
(two  issues),  1635.  Reprinted,  with  six  uncanonical  plays  in 
certain  copies  of  the  third  Shakespeare  Folio,  dated  1664, 
and  in  the  Fourth  Folio,  1685. 

PASTORAL    PLAYS    AFTER    THE    ITALIAN    MODEL 

A.  TRANSLATIONS  OF  ITALIAN  PASTORAL  DRAMA 

TASSO.TORQUATO  :  Aminta.  Translated  by  Abraham  Fraunce  in 
The  Countess  of  Pembroke's  Ivychurch,  1591.  Another  Trans- 
lation by  John  Reynolds,  1628. 

GUARINI,  BATTISTA  :  n  Pastor  Fido  :  "  Or  The  faitbfull  Shep- 
heard.  Translated  out  of  Italian  into  English,"  1602.  The 
identity  of  the  translator  is  uncertain. 

B.  ORIGINAL  DRAMAS  IN  SIMILAR  VEIN 

DANIEL,  SAMUEL  (For  a  list  of  Daniel's  collected  works,  seo 
p.  225  f)  :  The  Queene's  Arcadia.  "  A  Pastorall  Trage- 


296  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

comedie  presented  to  her  Maiestie  (King  James's  queen)  and 
her  Ladies,  by  the  Vniuersitie  of  Oxford  in  Christs  Church, 
In  August  last.  1605."  Printed  1606.  Reprinted  in  Daniel's 
"Certaine  Small  Workes,"  1607,  and  in  later  editions  of  his 
works. 

Hymen's  Triumph.  "  A  Fastorall  Tragicomsedie.  Presented 
at  the  Queenes  Court,"  1615.  Reprinted  in  "  The  Whole 
Workes  of  Samuel  Daniel,"  1623  and  later  editions. 

FLETCHER,  JOHN  :  The  Faithful  Shepherdess.  Ed.  n.  d.  (ca. 
1610).  Reprinted  1629, 1634, 1656, 1665.  Included  in  the  Sec- 
ond Beaumont  and  Fletcher  Folio,  1679,  and  later  editions. 

JONSON,  BENJAMIN  :  The  Sad  Shepherd,  "  Or,  A  Tale  of  Robin 
Hood."  Edition,  dated  1641,  included  in  the  Second  Jonson 
Folio,  1640. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE   HISTORY  PLAT 

CERTAIN  peculiar  conditions  of  popular  taste  and  the- 
atrical expediency  during  the  last  dozen  years  of  the 
sixteenth  century  resulted  in  the  evolution  by  the  side 
of  the  two  regular  branches  of  dramatic  poetry  of  a 
third  species,  recognized  in  the  tripartite  division  on 
the  title-page  of  the  1623  Shakespeare,  "Mr.  William 
Shakespeare's  Comedies,  Histories,  &  Tragedies,"  and 
always  since  respected  in  the  criticism  of  the  drama 
of  this  period.  The  term  "history  play"  is  difficult  of 
precise  theoretic  limitation;  and,  in  practice,  the  differ- 
entiation of  the  strict  members  of  this  new  type  from 
those  plays  on  historical  subjects  which  follow  the  more 
conservative  rules  of  comedy  or  tragedy  is  a  task  ap- 
proaching impossibility.  Works  such  as  the  two  parts 
of  "Henry  IV"  and  the  "Henry  V"  of  Shakespeare 
prove  sufficiently  the  right  of  the  history  play  to  con- 
sideration as  an  independent  literary  form.  Yet  it  is 
quite  impossible  to  exclude  from  such  consideration 
other  plays  which  accord  wholly,  like  "Richard  III," 
or  almost  wholly,  like  "Richard  II,"  with  the  strictest 
rules  of  tragedy;  while  any  ambitious  discussion  of  the 
genre,  unless  based  on  sane  definitions,  is  in  danger  of 
losing  itself  hopelessly  in  the  attempt  to  follow  such 
quasi-historical  will-o'-the-wisps  as  "George  a  Greene" 
and  "James  IV."  The  collective  treatment  of  all  Eliza- 
bethan plays  which  happen  to  present  historical  figures 
may  perhaps  have  a  curious  interest,  but  is  hardly  more 


298  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

susceptible  of  critical  justification  or  more  explanatory 
of  actual  facts  than  would  be  a  grouping  based  on  the 
locality  of  the  play's  action  or  the  nationality  of  its 
hero. 

Any  adequate  understanding  of  the  class  of  history 
plays  seems  to  require  the  clear  recognition  of  two  pre- 
liminary facts:  first,  that  many  of  the  finest  historical 
dramas  may  possess  either  not  at  all  or  only  in  small 
degree  the  irregularities  of  structure  and  tone  which 
mark  the  class  as  a  whole  for  separate  discussion;  and, 
second,  that  these  special  Elizabethan  irregularities 
may  manifest  themselves  in  the  treatment  of  foreign  as 
well  as  native  history.  There  are,  for  example,  a  number 
of  points  of  view  from  which  Marlowe's  "Tambur- 
laine"  and  "Massacre  at  Paris"  illustrate  better  than 
the  same  poet's  "Edward  II"  what  is  really  significant 
in  the  Elizabethan  interpretation  and  dramatic  pre- 
sentation of  history. 

The  especial  vogue  of  the  history  play  during  the  last 
years  of  Elizabeth  has  been  referred  in  the  first  sen- 
tence above  to  two  causes:  an  unusual  public  interest 
in  the  matters  treated  in  such  plays;  and  particular 
stage  conditions  which  toward  the  close  of  the  century 
greatly  stimulated  the  demand  for  dramas  constructed 
on  the  loose  and  facile  pattern  usual  to  this  type.  Two 
of  the  most  potent  factors  in  the  Elizabethan  literary 
revival  were  the  high  development  of  national  con- 
sciousness and  the  correlative  growth  of  interest  in  for- 
eign political  history .  Concurrently ,  there  evolved  during 
the  course  of  the  century  a  patriotic  feeling  of  national 
solidarity  and  a  lively  realization  of  that  outer  world  in 
which  England  as  a  world  power  must  play  her  part. 
Thus,  as  we  trace  the  steady  rise  of  English  national 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  299 

consciousness,  we  can  trace  also  the  increase  in  the 
value  set  upon  foreign  travel  and  the  mastery  of  foreign 
tongues,  and  the  growing  skill  in  observing  and  sketch- 
ing the  predominant  traits  of  other  peoples.1  The  bib- 
liographical evidence  for  this  double  trend  of  popular 
interest  lies  in  the  fact  that  such  books  as  the  Chroni- 
cles of  Holinshed,  Hall,  and  Stow,  Lord  Berners's  trans- 
lation of  Froissart,  the  versified  biographies  of  "The 
Mirror  for  Magistrates,"  and  North's  translation  of 
Plutarch's  Lives  rank  among  the  costliest,  most  elabo- 
rate, and  most  broadly  disseminated  productions  of 
the  Tudor  press.  Subjects  like  the  progress  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire,  the  careers  of  the  great  Tartar  con- 
querors, Tamerlane  and  Genghiz  Khan,  and  the  recent 
history  of  France  and  Italy  were  treated  in  such  an 
infinity  of  versions  that  it  is  frequently  a  matter  of  the 
greatest  difficulty  to  ascertain  the  particular  source  to 
which  the  Elizabethan  poet  resorted.  Furthermore, 
the  registers  of  the  Stationers'  Company  and  the  cata- 
logues of  old  libraries  teem  with  the  titles  of  prose  tracts 
and  ballad  broadsides  issued  incessantly  for  the  pur- 
pose of  keeping  the  masses  of  the  people  au  fa  it  with  the 
latest  political  developments  and  accidents  of  Europe. 
The  deep  excitement  and  triumphant  exhilaration  of 
the  Armada  year  (1588)  brought  into  a  definite  stream 
these  eddying  currents  of  national  and  cosmopolitan 
feeling,  and  had  the  effect  of  endowing  the  actualities 
of  historic  incident  and  character  —  particularly  when 
they  had  an  English  application  —  with  an  attractive 

1  For  illustrations  of  the  interest  felt  in  the  comparison  of  na- 
tional peculiarities,  see  Thomas  Ijord  Cromwell,  III.  iii,  08-85;  Hey- 
wood's  //  You  Know  Not  Me.  You  Know  Nobody,  part  ii  (ed.  1851, 
126);  Merchant  of  Venice,  I,  ii. 


300  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

power  which  for  some  years  made  the  vulgar  public 
eagerly  willing  to  condone  any  artistic  irregularity  in 
the  mode  of  their  presentment. 

It  chanced  that  the  period  of  greatest  general  interest 
in  the  narratives  of  history  coincided  with  an  era  of 
extreme  difficulty  for  playwrights  and  theatre  man- 
agers. The  sudden  increase  in  the  number  of  theatres 
between  1590  and  1600,1  and  the  necessity  of  satisfy- 
ing a  practically  unlimited  public  from  the  resources 
of  an  art  which  had  only  just  adapted  itself  to  local 
conditions,  produced  an  abnormal  demand  for  new 
plays  which  continually  threatened  to  outrun  the  possi- 
ble supply.  The  diary  of  Philip  Henslowe,  manager  of 
a  theatrical  company  which  acted  usually  in  competi- 
tion with  that  of  Shakespeare,  shows  how  the  dramatic 
shortage,  incident  largely  to  the  very  brief  runs  of  the 
day,  was  awkwardly  met  by  the  employment  of  a  num- 
ber of  literary  hacks  upon  the  hasty  completion  of  a 
single  play.  Under  such  unpromising  conditions,  to 
which  the  better  managed  company  of  Shakespeare 
and  Burbage  seems  comparatively  seldom  to  have  had 
recourse,  little  could  be  hoped  in  the  way  either  of 
structural  homogeneity  or  imaginative  content.  It  was 
necessary  to  select  a  theme  which  possessed  an  inherent 
popular  interest  and  which  would  admit  of  piecemeal 
treatment.  The  dramatization  of  history  was  generally 
found  the  readiest  and  most  acceptable  field  for  such 
rapid  improvisation.  The  great  majority  of  recorded 

1  The  Rose  Theatre  is  first  mentioned  as  in  use  in  1592,  though  it 
may  have  been  constructed  as  early  as  1587.  (Cf .  W.  W.  Greg,  Hens- 
lowes  Diary,  ii,  44  ff.)  The  Swan  and  Blackfriars  were  occupied  about 
1596.  The  Globe  was  built  in  1599,  the  Fortune  in  1600;  and  a  private 
theatre,  like  that  at  Blackfriars,  was  opened  by  a  boys'  company  at 
St.  Paul's  in  1599. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  301 

history  plays,  extant  and  lost,  were  produced  for  per- 
formance by  the  companies  of  Henslowe;  and  of  the 
entire  number  preserved  relatively  few,  except  those  of 
Marlowe  and  of  the  mature  Shakespeare,  escape  en- 
tirely the  faults  incident  to  divided  authorship  and 
ill-digested  plot. 

At  least  twenty  of  the  plays  on  English  and  French 
history  known  to  have  been  acted  by  Henslowe 's  com- 
panies have  perished  or  exist  only  as  incorporated  in 
later  works;  and  there  seems  little  reason  to  doubt  that 
they  were  justly  abandoned  to  oblivion.  The  species  as 
a  whole  was  a  plebeian  growth,  fostered  by  unpolished 
and  irregular  stage  conditions,  bound  to  few  if  any  of 
the  rules  of  art,  and  often  seeking  applause  solely  by 
motley  spectacular  effect.  Plays  like  "The  Wars  of 
Henry  I,"  "Pierce  of  Exton,"  "The  Funeral  of  Richard 
Coeur  de  Lion,"  the  two  parts  each  of  "Earl  Godwin" 
and  "Sir  John  Oldcastle,"  and  the  three  parts  of  "The 
Civil  Wars  of  France,"  all  compiled,  as  "Henslowe's 
Diary  "  shows,  during  the  years  1598  and  1599,  by  the 
united  labor  of  from  two  to  five  of  his  regular  hench- 
men,1 were  clearly  little  more  than  hasty  dishonest 
efforts  to  stay  temporarily  the  popular  dramatic  appe- 
tite. It  is  probable  that  fate  has  done  ample  justice  to 
the  species  in  preserving  a  single  example  out  of  the 
number  cited.2  But  the  widespread  serious  interest 
in  the  march  of  history,  which  Henslowe  thus  exploited 
for  the  sake  of  varied  and  sensational  entertainment, 
responded  to  more  reverent  treatment  and  bore  far 
riper  fruit. 

"Tamburlaine"  is,  more  than  any  other  drama,  the 

1  I.  e.,  Chettlc,  Dekker,  Wilson,  Drayton,  Munday,  and  Hathway. 
»  Namely,  The  First  Part  of  Sir  John  Oldctuile,  published  in  16001 


302  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

source  and  original  of  the  Elizabethan  history  play« 
Earlier  English  works  can  hardly  be  said  to  exert  any 
permanent  influence  upon  the  type  or  to  come  within 
its  limits.  Bale's  "King  John"  is  a  controversial  mo- 
rality, reinforced  by  historical  application;  "Ferrex 
and  Porrex,"  "The  Misfortunes  of  Arthur,"  and  "Lo- 
crine"  are  all  excluded,  not  because  they  present  myth- 
ical events,  —  for  such  discrimination  is  quite  alien  to 
the  Elizabethan  conception  of  history  and  to  the  pro- 
cedure of  Holinshed  and  the  authors  of  the  "  Mirror  for 
Magistrates,"  —  but  because  their  treatment  is  a  mere 
reflection  of  classic  practice  in  the  Roman  tragedy  or 
fabula  pr&texta. 

Marlowe's  imaginative  handling  of  his  historical 
sources  in  the  first  part  of  "Tamburlaine"  and  the 
picture  which  the  entire  work  paints  of  warlike  ambi- 
tion and  royal  magnificence,  did  much  to  fix  the  tone 
of  the  species,  and  proved  the  direct  inspiration  of  sev- 
eral of  the  most  notable  examples.  The  addition  of  the 
second  part  to  this  play  doubtless  suggested  the  all  but 
universal  practice  of  extending  the  short  stage  life  of 
any  popular  dramatization  of  history  by  easily  concocted 
continuations  bearing  the  same  name  but  often  mani- 
festing little  real  affinity.  One  of  the  earliest  of  the 
extant  plays  on  English  history,  "The  Troublesome 
Reign  of  John  King  of  England,"  printed  in  1591  as 
acted  by  the  Queen's  Players,  refers  pointedly  in  its 
prologue  to  Marlowe's  tragedy:  — 

"  You  that  with  friendly  grace  of  smoothed  brow 
Haue  entertaind  the  Scythian  Tamburlaine, 
And  given  applause  vnto  an  InBdel : 
Vouchsafe  to  welcome  (with  like  curtesie); 
A  warlike  Christian  and  your  Countreyman.", 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  3<u 

The  contrast  thus  challenged  is,  however,  only  super- 
ficial, and  results  to  the  crushing  disadvantage  of  the 
later  work.  The  two  parts  of  "King  John"  imitate 
the  two  parts  of  "Tamburlaine"  merely  in  so  far  as 
they  present  a  series  of  battles,  conspiracies,  and  es- 
capes ranging  over  a  number  of  years. 

The  infinite  diversity  of  the  late  sixteenth-century  his- 
tory plays  can  best  be  rendered  capable  of  orderly  treat- 
ment by  distributing  the  extant  specimens  among  five 
fairly  distinct,  though  not  mutually  exclusive,  classes: 

First.  Plays  of  mixed  type,  relatively  early  for  the 
most  part,  and  generally  characterized  by  artistic  un- 
certainty. 

Second.  Biographical  dramas:  collections  of  ill- 
unified  scenes  presenting  various  incidents  in  the  life  of 
some  famous  character. 

Third.  Histories  of  tragic  type :  plays  which  demand 
no  exemption  from  the  conservative  dramatic  rules, 
but  produce  the  effect  of  regular  tragedy  by  means  not 
strikingly  irregular. 

Fourth.  Plays  par  excellence  of  national  feeling  or 
national  philosophy,  where  the  normal  interest  hi 
dramatis  personas  is  more  or  less  absorbed  either  in  the 
expression  of  patriotic  sentiment  or  in  the  interpreta- 
tion of  problems  of  government  and  statecraft.  It  is 
this  class  which  gives  to  the  Elizabethan  history  play 
its  individuality  as  a  dramatic  s|K»cies. 

Fifth.  Romanticized  treatments  of  history,  in  which 
the  admixture  of  fact  possesses  no  real  significance  and 
deserves  no  special  attention. 

To  the  first  of  these  groups  belong  apparently  nearly 
all  of  the  lost  plays  mentioned  by  Henslowe,  except 
those  which  are  referable  to  the  biographical  class.  The 


804  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

same  group  includes  also  most  of  what  seem  to  be  the 
earliest  extant  attempts  at  dramatizing  history  subse- 
quent to  "Tamburlaine":  "The  Troublesome  Reign  of 
John,"  already  mentioned;  "The  Famous  Victories  of 
Henry  V";  "The  Life  and  Death  of  Jack  Straw";  "The 
True  Tragedy  of  Richard  III";  Lodge's  "Wounds  of 
Civil  War";  Marlowe's  "Massacre  at  Paris";  the 
Henry  VI  plays;  and  perhaps  also  Peele's  "Battle  of 
Alcazar."  Common  features  of  these  dramas  are  the  ab- 
sence of  a  central  theme,  the  rough  presentation  of  the 
conspicuous  events  of  many  years  without  any  effort  to 
inform  them  with  continuous  purpose  or  historic  per- 
spective, and  the  infusion  of  extraneous  comic  matter 
ranging  from  the  elaborate  buffoonery  of  "The  Famous 
Victories"  to  the  grisly  jokes  over  the  dead  Admiral's 
body  and  the  morbid  double  meanings  of  the  soldier's 
soliloquy  before  killing  Mugeroun.1  The  mingling  of 
comic  burlesque  with  the  serious  business  of  tragedy 
was  a  special  vice  of  the  time,  which  Shakespeare's 
practice  only  later  transmuted  into  a  virtue;  and  the 
excision  by  the  printer  of  "Tamburlaine"  of  the  un- 
worthy farcical  passages  "of  some  vaine  conceited  fon- 
dlings greatly  gaped  at  what  time  they  were  shewed 
vpon  the  stage"  has  not  wholly  freed  even  that  work 
from  indecorous  mirth. 

The  plays  on  King  John  and  Henry  V  have  a 
particular  interest  as  the  sources  in  large  measure  of 
dramas  by  Shakespeare.  It  is  in  the  latter  poet's  con- 
cern with  history  plays  as  collaborator,  reviser,  and 
innovator  that  the  student  of  Shakespeare  finds  the 
clearest  indications  of  the  lines  along  which  his  early 
dramatic  training  proceeded.  Shakespeare's  "King 

1  Massacre  at  Paris,  11.  487  ff,  812  ff. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  805 

John"  occupies  a  middle  position  in  date  and  in 
poetic  independence  between  the  Henry  VI  plays  and 
those  that  treat  Henry  IV  and  Henry  V.  From  "The 
Troublesome  Reign  of  John,"  written  for  the  most  part 
in  very  tolerable  blank  verse,  Shakespeare  derived  the 
entire  subject  matter  for  his  dramatization  of  the  same 
reign,  the  two  parts  of  the  original  work  being  so  con- 
densed that  the  end  of  Part  I  coincides  with  the  close 
of  Act  IV,  scene  2  of  the  later  play.  In  marked  con- 
trast with  his  more  diffident  handling  of  the  Henry  VI 
dramas,  Shakespeare  here  retains  practically  nothing 
of  the  language  of  his  source.  He  manifests  a  mature 
appreciation  of  character,  moreover,  in  the  skill  with 
which  he  vivifies  the  only  remarkable  figure  in  the  old 
play,  that  of  the  Bastard  Philip,  and  heightens  into 
personages  of  the  first  dramatic  importance  the  com- 
monplace original  conceptions  of  Arthur,  Constance, 
John,  and  Hubert.  Everywhere,  however,  the  struc- 
ture of  the  old  play  is  visible  behind  the  new  work. 
All  Shakespeare's  dramatis  personce  are  taken  from 
the  "Troublesome  Reign,"  with  the  single  exception 
of  Lady  Falconbridge's  servant,  James  Gurney,  who 
speaks  precisely  four  words  of  the  first  scene. 

Apart  from  the  improvements  already  noted,  Shake- 
speare's changes  are  relatively  slight  and  not  inevitably 
happy.  He  retains  the  absurd  identification  of  the  Vis- 
count of  Limoges  with  the  Archduke  of  Austria,  but  so 
reduces  the  part  of  that  actor  that  his  previous  concern 
in  the  death  of  Richard  I,  his  possession  of  the  "lion's 
hide,"  and  Philip's  consequent  hostility  are  barely  in- 
telligible. The  desire  for  compression  is  further  respon- 
sible for  the  practical  sacrifice  of  the  most  striking 
scene  of  the  old  play  —  that  in  which  Philip  confronts 


806  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

his  mother  —  and  for  the  omission  of  the  comic  por- 
tions depicting  the  vices  of  monasticism.  The  same 
cause  and  the  clearer  realization  of  John's  wily,  cow- 
ardly, and  selfish  nature  account  for  the  absence  of  the 
scenes  in  which  the  earlier  poet,  following  independ- 
ently the  line  of  Bale's  "King  John,"  portrays  the  king 
as  the  heroic  but  defeated  champion  of  English  liberty 
against  an  encroaching  papistry.  What  Shakespeare's 
play  gains  by  this  last  change  in  the  convincing  pre- 
sentation of  John's  character  it  loses  to  a  large  extent 
by  leaving  his  murder  at  the  hands  of  the  monks  of 
Swinstead  unmotivated  and  only  casually  portrayed. 

Upon  the  whole,  Shakespeare's  "King  John"  be- 
longs, like  the  other  play,  to  the  experimental  period 
of  historic  drama.  It  portrays  a  succession  of  political 
events  by  means  of  scenes  still  inconsecutive  and  often 
incongruous,  substituting  matches  of  declamatory  brag- 
gadocio for  the  realistic  presentation  of  battle,  and  ex- 
plaining policies  of  state  as  the  mere  accidents  of  in- 
dividual whim.  The  touch  of  genius  is  present  in  the 
language,  in  the  delineation  of  the  main  characters, 
and  in  several  fine  emotional  scenes;  but  the  work  lacks 
the  realization  of  the  dignity  of  history  and  the  com- 
prehensive unity  of  structure  which  mark  the  great 
and  permanently  successful  history  plays. 

"The  Famous  Victories  of  Henry  the  Fifth:  Con- 
taining the  Honorable  Battle  of  Agincourt"  is  a  drama 
of  considerably  less  merit  than  "The  Troublesome 
Reign  of  John,"  and  it  may  perhaps  be  ascribed  to  an 
earlier  date.  The  only  extant  sixteenth-century  edi- 
tion, published  in  1598,1  gives  a  text  concerning  much 

1  The  play  was  licensed  for  publication  in  1594,  and  may  have 
been  printed  in  that  year.  A  later  edition  appeared  in  1617. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  807 

of  which  it  is  difficult  to  decide  whether  prose  has  been 
misprinted  as  verse  or  whether  verse  has  been  alto- 
gether corrupted  into  prose.  The  earlier  scenes  deal 
mainly  with  the  thieving  exploits  and  humors  of  the 
young  prince  with  his  followers,  Ned  and  Tom,  and 
Falstaff's  pale  progenitor,  Sir  John  Oldcastle  or 
"Jockey,"  furnishing  thus  the  bare  suggestion  for  such 
parts  of  the  Henry  IV  plays  as  do  not  concern  the 
rising  of  the  Percies.  The  later  portion  of  the  "Famous 
Victories"  stands  in  a  similar  relation  to  "Henry  V," 
portraying  the  consequences  of  the  dauphin's  gift  of 
tennis  balls  through  the  battle  of  Agincourt  to  the 
wooing  and  betrothal  of  Katharine  of  France.  The 
play  has  been  attributed  on  conjectural  evidence  to 
the  authorship  of  the  famous  comedian  Richard  Tarle- 
ton,  who  died  in  1588;  and  it  was  undoubtedly  com- 
posed with  particular  attention  to  the  interests  of  a 
comic  actor.  The  humor,  however,  though  quite  dis- 
proportioned  in  quantity  to  the  serious  historical  mat- 
ter, is  generally  of  a  poor  sort  and  often  degenerates 
into  mere  horse-play. 

The  most  striking  scene  of  the  "Famous  Victories" 
—  that  which  dramatizes  Holinshed's  account  of  the 
meeting  between  the  turbulent  prince  and  the  chief 
justice  —  furnished  Shakespeare  merely  with  a  couple 
of  suggestions  for  the  second  part  of  "Henry  IV  ";  but 
elsewhere  the  relationship  is  more  essential,  and  con- 
stitutes the  only  serious  claim  of  the  old  play  upon  the 
reader's  patience.  A  complete  object  lesson  in  the 
development  of  the  "history"  from  its  rudiments  to 
maturity  is  furnished  by  a  comparison  of  the  tangled, 
ineffective  plot  of  the  "Famous  Victories"  with  the 
three  plays  which  at  the  height  of  his  perfection  in  this 


308  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

style  Shakespeare  constructed  out  of  the  same  material. 
With  the  leisurely  assurance  of  conscious  art,  the  later 
poet  devotes  an  entire  trilogy  to  the  development  of 
the  theme,  so  falteringly  outlined  by  his  predecessor, 
of  the  prince's  relation  to  his  youthful  companions,  his 
father,  and  his  country.  The  puerile  comic  efforts 
of  the  "Victories"  are  sorted,  selected,  raised  to  the 
highest  poetic  and  imaginative  power,  and  then  woven 
into  the  patriotic  political  fabric,  till  the  complemen- 
tary strains  of  realistic  humor  and  historic  ideality 
stand  out  as  two  in  one  like  the  mind  and  soul  respec- 
tively of  the  living  drama.  The  motley  farcical  scraps, 
with  which  the  "Famous  Victories"  is  largely  pieced 
together,  produced,  when  expanded  and  interpreted 
by  Shakespeare,  not  only  the  group  of  robbery  scenes 
in  the  first  part  of  "Henry  IV,"  but  the  impressment 
scenes  in  the  second  part  as  well,  and  the  first  sugges- 
tion for  Pistol's  experiences  in  the  wars.1 

"The  True  Tragedy  of  Richard  the  Third  "  was  first 
published  in  1594,  as  acted  by  the  Queen's  Players, 
the  same  company  by  which  "The  Troublesome  Reign 
of  John"  and  "The  Famous  Victories  of  Henry  V" 
are  known  to  have  been  performed.  No  direct  con- 
nection can  be  established  between  this  blundering 
effort  of  antiquated  dramaturgy  and  Shakespeare's 
"Richard  III";  nor  does  there  seem  plausible  reason 
for  supposing  that  the  "True  Tragedy"  was  intended 
in  any  way  as  a  continuation  of  the  Henry  VI  plays. 
Composed  in  a  rude  mixture  of  prose,  riming  hep- 

1  The  scenes  depicting  Falstaff 's  levying  of  soldiers  are,  of  course, 
elaborated  by  Shakespeare  with  much  personal  reminiscence,  but  the 
first  suggestion  doubtless  came  from  the  impressment  of  John  Cob- 
bler uiid  Derrick,  in  the  old  play. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  809 

tameters  of  the  transitional  pattern,  and  rough  blank 
verse,  the  work  shows  everywhere  in  the  development 
of  its  plot  as  well  a  backwardness  which  would  natu- 
rally relegate  it  to  the  pre-"Tamburlaine"  era,  though 
the  allusions  to  the  Armada  and  to  other  political 
events  make  it  certain  that  in  point  of  actual  date  it 
follows  that  play.  An  opening  Latin  couplet  in  which 
the  ghost  of  Clarence  denounces  blood  and  vengeance 
after  the  old  Senecan  manner,  is  followed  by  an  induc- 
tion in  which  Truth  and  Poetry  announce  the  subject 
and  explain  the  state  of  affairs.  The  presentation  of 
history  is  of  the  roughest  description.  Individualiza- 
tion  of  character  is  almost  wholly  lacking,  and  criti- 
cal purpose  appears  neither  in  the  selection  nor  in 
the  handling  of  events.  Even  the  magnificent  oppor- 
tunity of  the  battle  of  Bosworth  is  largely  frittered 
away,  and  Richard  dies  somewhat  tamely  after  fifteen 
lines  of  dull  soliloquy  in  prose.  Comic  relief  in  the 
proper  sense  does  not  exist,  though  something  of  the 
sort  has  been  clumsily  attempted  by  the  interpolation 
of  scenes  depicting  the  sufferings  of  Mistress  Shore 
and  the  moralizing  of  Richard's  page,  —  scenes  alto- 
gether out  of  keeping  with  the  rest  of  the  drama.  The 
following  lines  from  a  speech  of  Richard  illustrate  the 
Senecan  method  of  the  author  and  exemplify  his  high- 
est achievement  in  blank  verse,  while  they  suggest  at 
once  a  contrast  with  Shakespeare's  development  of  the 
same  idea  which  measures  well  the  difference  between 
the  two  writers:  — 

"  The  hell  of  life  that  hangs  vpon  the  Crowne, 
The  daily  cares,  the  nightly  dreames, 
The  wretched  crewes,  the  treason  of  the  foe, 
And  horror  of  iny  bloodie  practice  paat. 


310  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Strikes  such  a  terror  to  my  wounded  conscience. 
That  sleep  I,  wake  I,  or  whatsoeuer  I  do, 
Meethinkes  their  ghoasts  comes  gaping  for  reuenge. 
Whom  I  haue  slaine  in  reaching  for  a  Crowne. 
Clarence  complaines,  and  crieth  for  reuenge. 
My  nephues  bloods,  Reuenge,  reuenge,  doth  crie. 
The  headlesse  Peeres  come  preasing  for  reuenge. 
And  euery  one  cries,  let  the  tyrant  die. 
The  Sunne  by  day  shines  hotely  for  reuenge. 
The  Moone  by  night  eclipseth  for  reuenge. 
The  stars  are  turned  to  Comets  for  reuenge. 
The  Planets  chaunge  their  courses  for  reuenge. 
The  birds  sing  not,  but  sorrow  for  reuenge. 
The  silly  lambes  sits  bleating  for  reuenge. 
The  screeking  Rauen  sits  croking  for  reuenge. 
Whole  herds  of  beasts  comes  bellowing  for  reuenge. 
And  all,  yea  all  the  world  I  thinke, 
Cries  for  reuenge,  and  nothing  but  reuenge. 
But  to  conclude,  I  haue  deserued  reuenge." 

Resemblances  of  style  between  this  passage  and 
"Locrine"  have  been  adduced  as  evidence  of  the  com- 
mon authorship  of  the  two  plays;  and  though  the 
particular  contention  remains  entirely  unestablished, 
there  seems  no  doubt  that  "The  True  Tragedy  of 
Richard  III"  belongs  in  spirit  to  the  period  of  critical 
uncertainty  and  formlessness  which  "Locrine"  illus- 
trates. 

To  much  the  same  type  of  early  chronicle  play  be- 
long a  number  of  contemporary  dramatizations  of 
recent  foreign  history,  most  of  which  contain  clear 
evidence  of  the  influence  of  "Tamburlaine."  Several 
of  them,  indeed,  treat  incidents  in  the  Turkish  history 
which  Marlowe's  play  first  popularized  on  the  stage. 
Among  such  dramas  must  be  mentioned:  Peele's 
"Battle  of  Alcazar  "  (1594) ;  the  biographical  treatment 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  311 

of  the  same  subject,  likewise  performed  by  the  Lord 
Admiral's  Men,  and  published  in  1605  as  "The  Famous 
History  of  the  life  and  death  of  Captain  Thomas 
Stukely";  also  "The  Tragical  Reign  of  Selimus,  some- 
time Emperor  of  the  Turks"  (1594),  perhaps  written 
by  Robert  Greene; l  and  two  plays  by  Marlowe,  —  the 
hasty  "Massacre  at  Paris"  and  the  very  imaginative 
treatment  of  Turkish  relations  with  Malta  and  Cyprus 
in  "The  Jew  of  Malta." 

"The  Battle  of  Alcazar"  and  "Selimus"  are  formed 
on  much  the  same  early  pattern  as  "The  True  Tragedy 
of  Richard  III,"  though  both  possess  higher  poetic 
value;  and  "Selimus"  is  connected  with  "Locrine" 
by  a  similarity  which  only  the  closest  imitation  or 
partial  community  of  authorship  will  explain.2  "The 
Battle  of  Alcazar"  lacks  the  comic  element  usual  to 
the  class  and  copiously  present  in  "Selimus."  In  the 
devices  of  the  Presenter,  the  dumb-shows,  and  "three 
ghosts  crying  'vindicta,'"  the  former  play  follows  the 
most  primitive  models  of  its  kind;  while  the  peculiar 
tone  of  its  lyric  verse,  which  gives  it  its  chief  poetic 
value  and  renders  Peele's  authorship  to  my  mind 
nearly  indisputable,  deprives  it  almost  wholly  of  his- 
toric verisimilitude.  "The  Battle  of  Alcazar"  and 
many  other  plays  of  its  decade,  though  really  called 
forth  by  the  success  of  "Tamburlaine,"  failed  entirely 

1  Greene's  authorship  of  Selimu*  is  still  very  doubtful.  The  main 
evidence  in  its  favor  is  the  quotation  of  several  extracts  from  the  play 
over  R.  Greene's  name  in  England's  Parna»tus  (1600).  See  Hugo 
Gilbert's  valuable  dissertation,  Robert  Greene  »  Selimus,  Kiel.  1899; 
and  on  the  other  side  the  introductions  to  the  editions  of  Greene 
by  J.  C.  Collins  and  T.  II.  Dickinson. 

1  The  former  alternative  is  much  the  more  likely.  It  seems  clear 
that  Locrine  is  the  earlier  of  the  two  plays. 


312  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

to  utilize  the  new  dramatic  discoveries  in  plot  and 
character  and  harked  back  to  older  methods.  Yet 
Peele's  figure  of  the  villain  Moor,  Muly  Mahamet,  is 
undoubtedly  an  awkward  essay  in  Marlowe's  early 
manner;  while  the  particular  scene  —  the  most  notable 
in  the  play — in  which  that  character  appears  "with 
lion's  flesh  upon  his  sword,"  and  rings  the  changes  on 
the  theme,  "Feed  then  and  faint  not,  fair  Calipolis," 
is  the  closest  parody,  as  Shakespeare  recognized,  of  the 
"Tamburlaine"  heroics.1 

Thomas  Lodge's  "Wounds  of  Civil  War,  Lively  set 
forth  in  the  True  Tragedies  of  Marius  and  Sylla"  was 
acted  by  the  Lord  Admiral's  Company  at  a  period  not 
definitely  determined,  and  was  published  in  the  same 
year  with  "The  Battle  of  Alcazar"  and  "Selimus" 
(1594).  Lodge's  play  is  interesting  as  offering  prob- 
ably the  earliest  example  of  the  use  of  Plutarchan 
material  on  the  English  stage;  but  it  does  not  anywhere 
exhibit  the  slightest  recognition  of  the  rare  tragic 
opportunity  which  later  writers  were  to  find  in  the 
Lives.  In  "The  Wounds  of  Civil  War,"  a  large  quan- 
tity of  careful  and  not  unmelodious  blank  verse  is 
rendered  totally  ineffective  by  formlessness  of  plot 
and  psychological  poverty.  Bloodshed  and  violent 
declamation  abound,  of  course;  but  there  appears  no 
trace  of  fundamental  unity  or  artistic  premeditation 
in  the  handling  either  of  action  or  of  character. 
Equally  devoid  of  historic  sense  and  structural  ability 
are  Marlowe's  synopsis  of  French  history  during  the 
seventeen  years  immediately  past  (1572-1589)  in  "The 

1  See  Pistol's  ravings  in  2  Henry  IV,  II,  iv.  Cf.  also  Tucca  in  Dek- 
ker's  Satiromastix,  ed.  1873,  I,  230,  "  Feede  and  be  fat,  my  faire 
Calipolis." 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  813 

Massacre  at  Paris"  and  the  same  poet's  disjointed 
treatment  of  events  largely  mythical  or  distorted  in 
"The  Jew  of  Malta." 

Far  the  most  important  of  the  early  unmethodized 
history  plays  are,  on  many  accounts,  the  dramas  which 
deal  with  the  reign  of  King  Henry  VI.  In  these  plays, 
which  happen  to  illustrate  Shakespeare's  earliest  con- 
nection with  the  species,  there  appears  the  first  faint 
conception  of  a  great  continuous  purpose  and  a  uni- 
versal lesson  behind  the  blind  accidents  and  spectacu- 
lar horrors  of  history.  The  three  parts  form  in  their 
revised  state  a  single  drama,  proceeding  coherently 
from  the  exposition  of  the  discord  and  incapacity  of 
Henry  VI's  early  reign  to  the  final  bloody  death  with 
which  that  weak  sovereign  pays  the  penalty  of  his 
incompetence.  The  trilogy  must  be  viewed  as  a  whole 
to  perceive  the  central  principle  that  glimmeringly 
informs  it;  but  when  so  viewed  that  principle  becomes 
evident  beneath  the  vast  tangle  of  miscellaneous 
scenes.  It  is  the  doctrine  —  inherent  in  Elizabethan 
patriotism,  and  far  more  strongly  enunciated  in  the 
Richard  II-Bolingbroke  plays,  in  "Julius  Caesar," 
and  even  in  Marlowe's  "  Edward  II "  —  of  the  essential 
inconvertibility  of  the  politic  and  moral  virtues,  and 
the  futility  of  attempting  to  pay  off  the  great  debt 
which  the  governor  owes  the  governed  with  the  small 
coin  of  personal  piety  or  occasional  generosity. 

"King  Henry  VI,  Part  I,"  first  printed  in  the  1623 
Shakespeare,  was  acted  with  great  success  by  Lord 
Strange 's  company,  sixteen  performances  being  re- 
corded by  Henslowe  for  the  period  extending  from 
March  3,tJL5flgr4o  January  31  of  the  following  year. 
The  company  was  that  of  Shakespeare,  with  which 


314  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Henslowe  had  at  this  time  a  transient  connection;  and 
the  play  acted  was  probably  the  extant  amplification 
by  Shakespeare  of  an  earlier  version.  Since  the  origi- 
nal text  has  not  been  preserved,  it  is  impossible  to 
gauge  precisely  the  extent  of  the  reviser's  alterations; 
but  it  is  conventional  to  consider  the  scene  in  the 
Temple  Gardens  (II,  iv),  those  presenting  Talbot's 
death  (IV,  ii-vii),  and  the  interview  beween  Suffolk 
and  Margaret  in  V,  iii,  as  largely  Shakespeare's  inde- 
pendent invention;  while  the  general  polish  and  homo- 
geneity of  style  suggest  the  conscientious  line  by  line 
correction  which  can  be  proved  for  the  second  and 
third  parts  of  the  play. 

In  its  general  scope  the  first  part  of  "Henry  VI" 
belongs  to  the  most  artless  form  of  history  play. 
Events  covering  a  period  of  thirty-one  years  are  pre- 
sented without  regard  for  details  of  fact  or  chrono- 
logical sequence.  Dramatic  unity  is  defeated  by  the 
over-ambitious  attempt  to  develop  side  by  side  the 
three  separate  themes  of  the  wars  in  France,  the  con- 
troversy between  the  Duke  of  Gloucester  and  the 
Bishop  of  Winchester,  and  the  quarrel  of  York  and 
Somerset,  besides  certain  purely  imaginary  romantic 
episodes  like  that  of  Talbot  and  the  Countess  of 
Auvergne.  Both  in  the  first  and  the  second  part  of  the 
play  the  reader  is  embarrassed  by  the  difficulty  of 
reconciling  his  sympathy  with  the  good  Duke  Hum- 
phrey with  that  aroused  for  the  ambitious  York,  who, 
though  antagonistic,  like  Gloucester,  to  the  Beauforts 
(Winchester  and  Somerset),  yet  for  his  own  purposes 
cooperates  partly  with  Gloucester's  enemies,  and  thus 
gives  a  puzzling  triangular  effect  to  the  action  of  both 
plays.  Yet  efforts  at  unifying  the  dramatic  threads 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  315 

arc  not  absent  from  the  first  part,  as  in  the  imputa- 
tion of  responsibility  for  Talbot's  miscarriage  to  the 
mutual  recriminations  of  York  and  Somerset;  while 
Nash's  specific  tribute  in  "Pierce  Penniless"  (1594) 
and  the  immediate  flood  of  imitative  dramas  show  how 
the  play  evoked  a  loftier  patriotism  and  a  more  seri- 
ous interest  in  history  than  had  previously  existed. 

The  second  and  third  parts  of  "Henry  VI"  are  pre- 
served in  three  separate  versions.  The  earliest  edi- 
tions of  these  two  plays  appeared  in  1594  and  1595 
respectively,  with  the  following  titles:  "The  first  part 
of  the  Contention  betwixt  the  two  famous  Houses  of 
*VorEe  and  Lancaster,  with  the  death  of  the  good  Duke 
Humphrey:  And  the  banishment  and  death  of  the 
Duke  of  Suffolke,  and  the  Tragicall  end  of  the  proud 
Cardinall  of  Winchester,  with  the  notable  Rebellion 
of  lacke  Cade:  And  the  Duke  of  Yorkes  first  claim 
Vnto  the  Crowne  —  1594";  and  "The  true  Tragedie 
of  Richard  Duke  of  Y'orke,  and  the  death  of  good  King 
Henrie  the  Sixt,  with  the  whole  contention  betweene 
the  two  Houses  Lancaster  and  Yorke,  as  it  was  sun- 
drie  times  acted  by  the  Right  Honourable  the  Earle 
of  Pembrooke  his  seruants — 1595."  Both  plays  were 
reprinted  without  noteworthy  change  in  1600.  In  1619, 
a  second,  slightly  altered,  text  appeared,  the  two  parts 
being  combined  in  a  single  quarto  entitled  "The 
Whole  Contention  betweene  the  Famous  Houses, 
Lancaster  and  Yorke.  With  the  Tragicall  ends  of  the 
good  Duke  Humfrey,  Richard  Duke  of  Yorke,  and 
King  Henrie  the  sixt.  Diuided  into  two  Parts:  And 
newly  corrected  and  enlarged.  Written  by  William 
Shakespeare,  Gent."  Finally,  the  1623  Shakespeare 
Folio  printed  a  very  largely  amplified  and  carefully 


316  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

revised  text,  bringing  all  the  three  Henry  VI  plays 
for  the  first  time  into  direct  connection,  and  designat- 
ing those  we  are  specially  considering  as  the  second 
and  third  parts  in  the  trilogy. 

The  relation  of  these  different  texts  and  the  precise 
authorship  of  each  form  the  subject  of  the  most  ob- 
scure problem  in  the  textual  criticism  of  Shakespeare. 
There  seems  no  doubt,  however,  that  the  second  and 
third  parts  of  "Henry  VI,"  like  the  first  part,  are  not 
original  creations,  but  revisions  by  Shakespeare  during 
_\   his  dramatic  novitiate  of  plays  already  extant;  and 
there  is  decisive  evidence  to  show  that  Christopher 
Marlowe  was  the  partial  author,  at  least,  of  the  earlier 
NX  versions.    Furthermore,  the  testimony  of  style  and 
'structure  goes  far  to  prove  that  Shakespeare's  final 
text  of  the  plays,  as  published  by  his  editors  in  1623, 
antedates  1594; l  and  therefore  that  the  perfect  version 
was  in  existence,  and  had  presumably  been  acted, 
before  the  appearance  of  the  earliest  edition  of  the 
imperfect  "First  Part  of  the  Contention"  and  "True 
Tragedy"  (1594,  1595).    Now,  all  the  circumstances 
surrounding  the  publication  of  the  various  imperfect 
If  texts  of  the  two  plays  in  1594,  1595,  1600,  and  1619 
|  indicate  that  they  were  surreptitious  undertakings 
I  brought  out  without  sanction  of  the  author  and  with- 
'  out  the  means  of  access  to  the  corrected  copy.   The 
latter  would  be  jealously  guarded  by  the  theatrical 
company  to  which  it  belonged,  and  some  stray  copy 
of  the  earlier,  antiquated  text  must  have  formed  the 
basis  of  all  the  versions  previous  to  1623.   The  1619 

1  The  nature  of  Greene's  allusion  in  the  Groatsworth  of  Wit  is 
such  as  to  make  it  probable  that  Shakespeare's  revision  antedated 
Greene's  death  in  September,  1592. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  317 

text,  which  first  makes  claim  of  Shakespearean  author- 
ship, stands  intermediate  in  some  respects  between 
that  of  1594-1595  and  the  final  version.  Though  cer- 
tainly founded  in  the  main  upon  the  same  original  as 
the  former,  it  contains  a  few  independent  details  and 
a  few  others  which  conform  in  part  to  the  corrected 
acting  version. 

The  second  and  third  parts  of  "Henry  VI"  form  in 
a  peculiar  degree  a  single  play.  Neither  part  is  dra- 
matically sufficient  in  itself;  and  it  seems  clear  that 
each  was  composed  with  the  other  part  distinctly  in 
view,  and  by  the  same  authors.  There  is  no  reason  to 
suppose  that  Shakespeare  —  who  carefully  revised  all 
the  verse,  expanded  or  recast  many  of  the  finest 
speeches,  transposed  and  perhaps  even  added  a  few 
scenes  in  minor  key  —  altered  materially  the  general 
structure  of  the  plays,  or  even  effected  any  such  radi- 
cal change  in  character  as  he  did,  for  example,  in  his 
treatment  of  the  old  play  of  "King  John."  Both  parts 
reflect  the  early  naive  conception  of  history  play,  lack- 
ing all  appreciation  of  dramatic  climax  and  possessing 
only  such  general  unity  as  was  naturally  inherent  in 
their  subject  matter.  The  interest  of  the  second  part 
revolves  about  two  centres,  Duke  Humphrey  and 
York;  that  of  the  third  follows  York  as  far  as  the  end 
of  the  first  act,  and  then  divides  itself  between  Ed- 
ward, Richard,  and  Warwick.  Both  plays  introduce 
artlessly  a  good  deal  of  extraneous  material,  for  no 
higher  purpose,  apparently,  than  the  simple  ambition 
to  present  the  audience  with  every  scrap  of  material 
which  the  chronicles  afford.  Such,  for  instance,  are 
the  passages  dealing  with  the  conjuring  and  punish- 
ment of  the  Duchess  of  Gloucester  and  the  episodes  of 


318  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Simpcox  and  Horner  in  Part  II,  and  the  scene  between 
King  Henry  and  the  Keepers  in  Part  III. 

The  highest  dramatic  merit  of  these  plays  consists 
in  the  characterization  of  Richard,  Duke  of  York;  and 
this  figure,  which  belongs  clearly  to  the  earliest  ver- 
sion of  the  work,  is  incontrovertibly  the  production  of 
Marlowe.  York's  character  is  a  repetition,  somewhat 
more  sympathetically  and  amply  portrayed,  of  that  of 
Guise  in  "The  Massacre  at  Paris,"  with  all  Guise's 
Machiavellian  cunning  and  lofty  resolution  and  with 
something  more  of  the  graceful  charm  which  marks 
Tamburlaine.  This  picture  Shakespeare  altered  in  no 
essential,  though  he  expanded  many  of  Marlowe's 
speeches  in  such  a  manner  that  a  comparison  of  the 
earliest  and  latest  texts  makes  it  possible  to  trace  with 
considerable  exactitude  the  reverent  yet  independent 
touch  with  which  the  later  writer  filled  in  the  lines  of 
the  earlier. 

With  Guise's  long  soliloquy  near  the  beginning  of  the 
"Massacre"  should  be  compared  the  first  soliloquy  of 
York  (2  Henry  VI,  I,  i,  214  ff),  which  I  quote  from  the 
text  of  1594:  — 

"  Anioy  and  Maine,  both  giuen  vnto  the  French, 
Cold  newes  for  me,  for  I  had  hope  of  France, 
Euen  as  I  haue  of  fertill  England, 
A  day  will  come  when  Yorke  shall  claime  his  owne, 
And  therefore  I  will  take  the  Neuels  parts, 
And  make  a  show  of  loue  to  proud  Duke  Humphrey: 
And  when  I  spie  aduantage,  claime  the  Crovvne, 
For  thats  the  golden  marke  I  seeke  to  hit; 
Nor  shall  proud  Lancaster  vsurpe  my  right, 
Nor  hold  the  scepter  in  his  childish  fist, 
Nor  vveare  the  Diademe  vpon  his  head, 
Whose  church-like  humours  fits  not  for  a  Crovvne: 
Then  Yorke  be  still  a  while  till  time  do  serue. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  319 

Watch  thou,  and  wake  when  others  be  asleep*, 

To  prie  into  the  secrets  of  the  state. 

Till  Henry  surfeiting  in  ioyes  of  loue, 

With  his  new  bride,  and  England*  dear  bought  queene. 

And  Humphrey  with  the  Peeres  be  falne  at  iarrea, 

Then  will  I  raise  aloft  the  milke-white  Rose. 

With  whose  svveete  smell  the  aire  shall  be  perfumde. 

And  in  my  Standard  beare  the  Armes  of  Yorke, 

To  graffle  with  the  House  of  Lancaster: 

And  force  perforce,  ile  make  him  yeeld  the  Crowne, 

Whose  bookish  rule  hath  puld  faire  England  dovvne." 

Throughout,  York's  character  and  language  show 
strongly  the  impress  of  Marlowe's  handling,  and  his 
two  great  penultimate  speeches  in  the  first  act  of  the 
Third  Part  (I,  iv,  111-149,  152-168)  prove  themselves 
in  sentiment,  verse-flow,  and  verbal  reminiscence  un- 
mistakable productions  of  that  poet.  I  quote  again 
the  version  of  the  earliest  text,  that  of  the  1595  octavo, 
with  which  the  very  slightly  altered  readings  of  the 
final  edition  can  profitably  be  compared :  — 

"  She  wolfe  of  France,  but  worse  than  Wolues  of  France, 
Whose  tongue  more  poison 'd  [poisons]  than  the  Adders  tooth 
How  ill  beseeming  is  it  in  thy  sexe. 
To  triumph  like  an  Amazonian  trull 
Vpon  his  woes,  whom  Fortune  captiuates  ? 
But  that  thy  face  is  visardlike,  vn changing, 
Made  impudent  by  vse  of  euill  deeds: 
I  would  assaie,  proud  Queene  to  make  thee  blush.    . 

v    > 

Thou  art  as  opposite  to  euerie  good. 

As  the  Antipodes  are  vnto  vs. 

Or  as  the  south  to  the  Septentrion. 

Oh  Tygers  hart  wrapt  in  a  womans  hide! 

How  couldst  thou  draine  the  life  bloud  of  the  childe. 

To  bid  the  father  wipe  his  eies  wit  hall. 

And  yet  be  scene  to  beare  a  womans  face  ? 


3SO  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Women  are  milde,  pittifull,  and  flexible, 

Thou  indurate,  sterne,  rough,  remorcelesse. 

Bids  thou  me  rage  ?  why  now  thou  hast  thy  will. 

Wouldst  haue  me  weepe  ?  why  so  thou  hast  thy  wish. 

For  raging  windes  blowes  vp  a  storme  of  teares, 

And  when  the  rage  alaies  the  raine  begins. 

These  teares  are  my  sweet  Rutlands  obsequies, 

And  euerie  drop  begs  vengeance  as  it  fals, 

On  thee  fell  Clifford,  and  the[e]  false  French  woman. 

.•••«•»••••• 

That  face  of  his  the  hungrie  Cannibals 

Could  not  haue  tucht,  would  not  haue  staind  with  blood. 

But  you  are  more  inhumane,  more  inexorable, 

0  ten  times  more  then  Tygers  of  Arcadia  [Hyrcania], 
See  ruthlesse  Queene  a  haplesse  fathers  teares. 

This  cloth  thou  dipts  in  bloud  of  my  sweet  boy. 

And  loe  with  teares  I  wash  the  bloud  awaie. 

Keepe  thou  the  napkin  and  go  boast  of  that, 

And  if  thou  tell  the  heauie  storie  well, 

Vpon  my  soule  the  hearers  will  sheed  teares, 

I,  euen  my  foes  will  sheed  fast  falling  teares, 

And  saie  alas,  it  was  a  pitteous  deed. 

Here,  take  the  crowne,  and  with  the  crowne  my  curse. 

And  in  thy  need  such  comfort  come  to  thee, 

As  now  I  reape  at  thy  two  cruell  hands. 

Hard-harted  Clifford,  take  me  from  the  world, 

My  soule  to  heauen,  my  bloud  vpon  your  heads. 

North.  Had  he  bin  slaughterman  of  all  my  kin, 

1  could  not  chuse  but  weepe  with  him  to  see, 
How  inlie  anger  gripes  his  hart." 

Not  merely  in  the  portrayal  of  the  most  conspicuous 
figure,  but  through  the  entire  handling  of  these  plays, 
^the  main  finger  is  that  of  Marlowe,  and  the  finest  pas- 
sages tend  rather  to  glorious  declamation  than  the 
serious  presentation  of  facts.  Typically  Marlovian 
are  Suffolk's  passionate  outburst  to  the  Queen  upon 
his  banishment  (2  Henry  VI,  III,  ii,  308 ff),  the  Queen's 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  321 

denunciation  of  King  Henry's  weakness  (3  Henry 
VI,  I,  i,  231  ff),  and  the  dying  speeches  of  Warwick 
(ibid.,  V,  ii).  Out  of  such  material  so  respectfully 
treated  by  the  reviser  it  was  impossible  to  achieve 
dramatic  unity  or  accuracy  of  impression;  and  the 
Henry  VI  plays  remained  after  Shakespeare's  elabo- 
ration substantially  what  they  had  been  before,  — 
rather  examples  of  the  utmost  poetic  capability  of  the 
old  chaotic  "history"  than  precursors  of  the  new  type 
which  Shakespeare  was  to  develop. 

The  biographical  play,  the  second  form  in  which 
crude  interest  in  the  dramatization  of  history  showed 
itself,  requires  little  discussion.  Extant  specimens  of 
the  type  are:  "The  Famous  History  of  the  Life  and 
Death  of  Captain  Thomas  Stukely  "  (1605),  previously 
mentioned;  "The  True  Chronicle  History  of  the  whole 
Life  and  Death  of  Thomas. Lord  Cromwell"  (1602); 
"The  First  Part  of  Sir  John  Oldcastle"  (1600); »  and 
the  manuscript  play  of  "Sir  Thomas  More."  But 
there  can  be  no  question  that  the  great  majority  of 
such  works,  copiously  suggested  by  titles  preserved  in 
"  Henslowe's  Diary,"  perished  after  they  had  served 
the  temporary  need  which  produced  them.  It  has  been 
hinted  already  that  the  biographical  history  inherited 
from  the  old  heroic  drama,  and  continued  the  tradi- 
tion established  by  that  type.2  As  higher  requirements 
of  plot  and  character  began  to  drive  from  the  stage 
the  rambling  presentation  of  the  adventures  of  mythi- 
cal heroes  like  Sir  Clyomon  and  Huon  of  Bordeaux, 
it  was  found  possible  still  to  hold  the  public  ear  by 
treating  the  lives  of  real  personages  in  much  the  same 
disjointed  manner.  The  very  play  of  "Tamburlaine," 

1  No  second  part  seems  to  have  been  published. 
»  See  p.  25*. 


322  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

for  example,  which  on  the  one  hand  marks  the  devel< 
opment  of  the  naive  chivalrous  play  into  a  character 
drama  so  much  higher  in  tone  as  to  belong  to  an  essen- 
tially different  and  incompatible  species,  testifies  on 
the  other  hand  to  the  general  interest  in  historic  per- 
sonality which  gave  temporary  acceptance  to  even 
the  most  banal  and  formless  presentations.  It  is 
doubtless  no  accident  that  Henslowe's  entries  indi- 
cate an  abandonment  of  plays  like  "Huon  of  Bor- 
deaux" (1593),  "Godfrey  of  Bulloigne"  (1594),  and 
"Chinon  of  England"  (1596),  and  an  increase  in  such 
titles  as  "Tamar  Cam"  (1592),  "Buckingham"  (1593), 
"Stukely"  (1596), " Hardicanute " (1597), "Oldcastle" 
(1599),  "Owen  Tudor"  (1600),  and  "Biron"  (1602). 
Of  the  four  extant  biographical  plays  mentioned  above, 
two,  "Oldcastle"  and  "More,"  are  clearly  the  result 
of  divided  authorship.  None  possesses  in  any  degree 
unity  of  conception  or  treatment;  and  all  depend  self- 
confessedly  upon  the  attractive  power  of  the  individ- 
ual careers  presented  to  compensate  for  many  defi- 
ciencies of  execution.  Of  the  detached  scenes  which 
compose  all  these  works,  the  most  successful,  and  the 
most  significant  historically,  are  probably  those  in 
"Oldcastle,"  dealing  with  the  conspiracy  of  Cambridge, 
Scroope,  and  Grey,  and  the  admirable  portrayal  of  the 
111  May  Day  riot  in  "Sir  Thomas  More,"  a  passage 
which  it  may  perhaps  not  be  over-credulous  to  regard 
as  partially  the  work  of  Shakespeare's  early  hand. 

The  earliest  English  play  to  treat  the  material  of 
history  with  conscious  reverence  for  the  established 
rules  of  dramatic  composition  is  Marlowe's  "Edward 
II."  l  In  this  work,  which  introduced,  if  it  did  not 

1  It  may  be  that  this  distinction  should  be  shared  by  Marlowe's 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  323 

create,  the  third  type  of  history  drama,  considerations 
of  temporary  popular  appeal  are  for  the  first  time  sub- 
ordinated to  the  austerer  principles  of  permanent  art. 
The  forethought  with  which  Marlowe  selected,  altered, 
and  condensed  the  chronicle  narratives,  till  he  formed 
from  their  various  blurred  outlines  the  single  consist- 
ent picture  he  desired,  was  a  new  thing  in  dramatized 
history,  and  it  gives  to  his  play,  when  contrasted  with 
the  motley  unreasoned  patchwork  that  surrounded 
it,  the  lucidity  and  restraint  of  a  classic.  It  may  be 
that  a  certain  inconsequence  in  the  presentation  of 
character  conflict,  and  a  tendency  to  juggle  with  the 
springs  of  emotion,  which  always  disqualifies  Marlowe 
for  the  judicial  impartiality  of  Shakespeare,  cause 
"Edward  II"  to  fall  somewhat  short  of  the  highest 
form  of  tragedy,  —  the  tragedy  of  characterization. 
Yet  it  is  one  of  the  purest  instances  of  the  tragedy  of 
circumstance,  and  it  raised  the  history  play  to  the  dig- 
nity of  permanent  literature,  inaugurating  a  new  spe- 
cies and  creating  a  public  for  the  great  histories  of 
Shakespeare. 

Shakespeare's     first     independent     history    plays, 
"Richard  III"  and  "Richard  II,"  are  composed  in  / 
marked  imitation  of  the  work  of  Marlowe.   "Richard 
III,"  written  in  all  probability  about  1593,  within  a 
year  or  two  of  the  production  of  "Edward  II,"  reverts 
to  the  earlier  structural  model  of  "Tamburlaine"  and 
"Faustus,"   concentrating   attention    upon   a   single  / 
imposing  figure  and  rioting  in  crude  melodramatic  I 

Dido,  Quern  of  Carthage,  in  which  Thomas  Nash  had  some  vague  con- 
cern. The  subject  of  I)i<lo,  however,  i.s  fur  less  seriously  historic  than 
that  of  Edward  II ;  and  much  obscurity  exUb*  in  regard  to  the  prccue 
date  and  origin  of  the  former  play. 


324  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

effect.  In  certain  details,  indeed,  such  as  the  emphasis 
laid  upon  the  power  of  the  curse,1  the  insistence  on  the 
significance  of  dreams,2  and  the  demoniac  figure  of 
Margaret,  who  follows  like  an  avenging  genius  the 
just  calamities  of  the  House  of  York,  the  play  shows 
itself  influenced  by  the  earlier  spirit  of  Senecan  trag- 
edy. But,  with  all  its  glaring  immaturity,  "Richard 
III"  exhibits,  both  in  the  conception  of  its  hero  and 
in  the  general  conduct  of  its  plot,  a  fuller  tragic  pro- 
mise than  "Edward  II"  had  attained.  The  rough  out- 
line of  Richard's  character  —  his  Machiavellian  self- 
ishness and  frank  confession  of  villainy  —  is,  of  course, 
the  same  as  that  of  Marlowe's  Guise,  Barabas,  and 
Mortimer;  but  this  outline  is  filled  in  with  the  human- 
izing perception  of  the  highest  genius.  In  his  masterly 
assumption  of  guilelessness  and  simple  dealing,3  his 
attempt  at  explaining  his  villainy  to  himself,  his  im- 
mense delight  in  his  mischievous  mental  power,4  and 
the  imperturbable  sang-froid  with  which  he  turns 
against  their  authors  the  curses  of  Margaret  and  the 
suspicions  of  the  Woodvilles,  Richard  presents  a 
character  altogether  different  from  that  he  bears  in 
the  Henry  VI  plays  and  suggestive  at  every  point  of 
Shakespeare's  greatest  triumph  in  the  portrayal  of 
evil  genius,  —  the  character  of  lago  in  "Othello."  In 
one  respect,  indeed,  the  less  mature  treatment  of 
Richard  is  given  a  turn  which  invests  that  figure  with 
the  human  probability  and  pathos  somewhat  lacking 
in  the  super-normal  lago.  It  is  the  delicate  touch 

1  Cf.  I,  iii,  111  ff;  IV,  iv;  V,  i. 

1  I,  iv,  9  ff;  III,  ii,  10  ff;  V,  iii,  118  ff. 

1  E.  g.,  I,  iii,  47  ff;  II,  i,  60  ff;  II,  ii,  153;  III,  iv,  53-55. 

4  I.  ii,  228  ff;  IV,  iv,  431. 


THE   HISTORY  PLAY  325 

which  shows  the  hero's  loss  at  the  crisis  of  the  play  of 
his  previously  invincible  self-confidence,  as  he  feels 
in  confusion,  though  still  undaunted,  the  approach 
of  inevitable  doom.  The  irritable  uncertainty  of  his 
commands  to  Catesby  when  he  hears  of  Richmond's 
arrival  (IV,  iv,  440  ff),  his  sudden  suspiViousness  of 
fate  and  friends  (IV,  iv,  509  ff;  V,  iii,  2, 8,  72-74),  and 
the  horror  and  magnificent  recovery  of  the  dream 
scene  humanize  the  figure  of  Richard  and  accom- 
plish that  tragic  pity  which  Marlowe  wins  for  his 
Edward  by  the  less  dramatic  recourse  to  pure  emo- 
tionalism. 

In  structure,  also,  "Richard  III"  satisfies  the  re- 
quirements of  high  tragedy  more  fully  than  the  riper 
and  richer  play  of  Marlowe.  Though  the  former  drama 
contains  but  one  great  protagonist,  the  battle  which 
he  wages  against  the  overwhelming  consequences  of 
curse,  prophecy,  and  accumulated  crime  is  so  vividly 
depicted  that  there  is  nowhere  a  trace  of  incoherence 
or -the  least  slackening  of  suspense.  "Richard  III"  is 
the  final  achievement  in  the  single-character  drama, 
and  it  has  continued,  from  the  time  of  Burbage  to  the 
present,  one  of  the  most  fruitful  opportunities  for  the 
great  tragic  actor.  Its  success  where  other  plays  of  the 
kind  failed  of  permanent  effectiveness  results  from  its 
conception  of  the  genius  of  history  as  an  inexorable 
fate  against  which  the  hero  maintains  a  mortal  and 
hojxjless  combat.  "Richard  III"  must  l>e  studied  in 
the  closest  connection  with  the  Henry  VI  plays.  The 
latter  end  with  the  picture  of  the  complete  triumph 
of  the  House  of  York  and  the  prostration  of  injured 
Lancaster.  "Richard  III"  has  for  its  great  theme  the 
exposition  of  the  punishment  of  the  offenders  at  each 


326  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

other's  hands,  and  the  establishment  of  predestined 
right  in  the  fulfilment  of  Henry's  prophecy  concerning 
Richmond's  reign  (3  Henry  VI,  IV,  vi,  68  ff)  and  the 
union  of  the  roses.  In  spirit  and  purpose  this  play  is 
probably  the  closest  parallel  in  English  literature  to 
the  tragedy  of  ^Eschylus. 

"King  Richard  II,"  composed  probably  a  year  later 
than  "Richard  III,"  differs  very  greatly  from  that 
play,  and  though  it  marks  an  advance  in  dramatic 
capability,  must  be  reckoned  individually  a  less  power- 
ful tragedy.  "Richard  III"  ends  a  tetralogy  dealing 
with  selfish  ambition  and  civil  strife;  "Richard  II" 
begins  another  series  of  four  plays  in  which  Shake- 
speare treats  primarily  questions  of  good  government 
and  national  patriotism.  The  latter  work  was  most 
unmistakably  suggested  by  "Edward  II,"  although 
perhaps  not  properly  an  imitation;  and  the  decision 
concerning  the  respective  merits  of  the  two  plays  is 
a  matter  of  some  delicacy.  "Edward  II"  is  far  more 
mature,  and,  on  the  whole,  doubtless  a  finer  drama. 
Much  of  "Richard  II"  is  lacking  in  vigor.  The  two 
challenge  scenes  (I,  i;  IV,  i,  1-106)  and  that  which 
deals  with  the  interrupted  tournament  (I,  iii)  read 
almost  like  flashy  imitations  of  Sir  Walter  Scott :  they 
have  no  dignity  and  they  do  not  discriminate  char- 
acter. The  introduction  of  Aumerle's  conspiracy  is 
an  otiose  offence  against  the  laws  of  tragic  compres- 
sion, and  some  of  Richard's  long  speeches  exceed  in 
vapidity  what  the  spectator  will  patiently  endure  from 
even  a  confessedly  weak  hero.  These  are  the  defects 
of  youth,  embarrassed  in  the  handling  of  a  new  style, 
and  they  find  no  parallel  in  the  careful  restraint  of 
"Edward  II."  The  special  merit  of  Shakespeare's 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  3«7 

play  consists,  as  has  been  pointed  out,1  in  the  substi- 
tution of  a  single  well-defined  conflict  between  the  king  X" 
and  Boliugbroke  instead  of  the  constantly  changing 
bickerings  of  "Edward  II,"  and  in  the  clear  demon- 
stration of  the  poet's  theory  of  royal  responsibility. 
These  features  both  make  for  structural  unity  and 
argue  the  existence  of  tragic  capacity  considerably  in 
excess  of  the  actual  performance  of  the  play. 

The  most  interesting  thing  about  "Richard  II"  is 
the  character  of  Richard.  The  poetic  irresolution  and 
tendency  to  masquerade  like  a  player  king  in  his  royal 
dignity  were  not  peculiarities  of  the  true  Richard  as 
Holinshed  portrays  him;  and  the  stress  upon  these 
qualities  so  far  obscures  the  tyranny,  improvidence, 
and  violence  of  the  historical  personage  that  the  wild 
energy  of  the  death  scene  appears  positively  out  of 
keeping.  Of  all  Shakespeare's  monarchs,  Richard  II 
is  the  only  one  whose  kingship  seems  painted  and 
artificial.  From  the  first  scene  he  speaks  and  thinks 
less  like  the  born  sovereign  than  the  enthroned  par- 
venu, making  garish  show  of  the  supremacy  which  he 
should  take  for  granted;  and  it  sometimes  looks  almost 
as  if  Shakespeare  were  unjustly  travestying  Marlowe's 
treatment  of  the  weak  but  always  royal  Edward.  The 
truth  probably  is  that  both  Richard  and  Bolingbroke 
are  rather  sketches  of  the  two  mental  types  which 
Shakespeare  recognized  within  himself  than  serious ' 
portraits  of  historic  figures.  If  we  except  Hamlet,  as 
we  should  do,  Richard  is  Shakespeare's  last  example, 
not  wholly  unfavorable,  of  that  type  of  intellectual 
triflcr  who  loses  sight  of  truth  and  justice  in  the  cult  of 
felicitous  novelty;  and  his 

>  Sec  p.  251. 


328  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"  Taffeta  phrases,  silken  terms  precise, 
Three-piled  hyperboles,  spruce  affectation, 
Figures  pedantical," 

have  an  identical  nature  and  origin  with  those  which 
the  young  Shakespeare  was  continually  renouncing 
through  the  mouth  of  Biron  and  others,  and  continu- 
ally yielding  to  again.  It  is  this  turn  of  mind,  strik- 
ingly illustrated  in  the  ridiculous  conceits  of  the  abdi- 
cation scene  and  the  king's  last  soliloquy,  to  which  the 
poet  unhistorically  ascribes  Richard's  fall;  while  in 
the  successful  Bolingbroke  he  emphasizes  the  corre- 
sponding virtues  of  prompt  practical  decision  and  free- 
dom from  whimsicality.  The  story  of  Shakespeare's 
life  may  perhaps  testify  to  the  ultimate  preponderance 
of  the  latter  attitude,  and  his  work,  I  believe,  shows  his 
final  leaning  toward  the  type  of  Bolingbroke.1 

A  roughly  contemporary  example  of  tragedy  con- 
structed from  historical  material  is  preserved  in  an 
untitled  British  Museum  manuscript,  which  has  been 
twice  printed  and  which  is  often  referred  to  as  "The 
Tragedy  of  Woodstock."  This  play  deals  with  the 
reign  of  Richard  II,  and  offers  an  interesting  contrast 
to  Shakespeare's  treatment  of  the  same  theme.  The 
principal  figure  is  the  king's  uncle,  Thomas  of  Wood- 
stock, Duke  of  Gloucester;  and  the  tragedy  ends  with 
the  circumstances  immediately  consequent  upon  the 
murder  of  that  personage  in  1397,  —  precisely  the  point 
at  which  Shakespeare's  play  begins.  The  events  of 
fifteen  years  are  boldly  and  skillfully  shifted  with  a 
view  to  the  dramatic  presentation  of  the  struggle 
which  the  humorous  and  patriotic  old  hero  wages 

1  See,  however,  in  opposition  to  this  view  the  admirably  ex- 
pressed argument  of  W.  B.  Yeats  in  Ideas  of  Good  and  Evil,  152  ff. 


THE  HISTORY   PLAY  329 

against  the  rash  extravagance  of  the  king  and  the 
destructive  rapacity  of  his  favorites.  The  picture  of 
Richard's  wild,  improvident  self-indulgence  is  very 
much  truer  to  the  real  character  than  is  that  of  the 
poetic  royal  dilettante  whom  Shakespeare  paints. 
Moreover,  the  unknown  author  of  this  play  has  strongly 
portrayed  in  the  elevation  of  Tresillian,  Bushy,  Bagot, 
and  Greene,  in  the  crushing  tyranny  of  the  blank  char- 
ters, the  farming  out  of  England,  and  the  murder  of 
Gloucester,  real  causes  of  the  king's  overthrow  which 
it  has  pleased  Shakespeare  in  his  largely  imaginary 
treatment  to  pass  lightly  over. 

The  parallels  between  "Woodstock"  and  the  plays 
of  "Edward  II"  and  "2  Henry  VI,"  which  Keller 
cites,1  seem  to  me  to  have  very  little  pertinence;  but 
it  cannot  well  be  doubted  that  the  former  work  was 
influenced  by  Marlowe's  example  in  its  handling  of 
the  relation  between  Richard  and  his  sycophants,  the 
death  of  Woodstock,  and  the  controversy  between  the 
peers  and  king.  The  author  of  "Woodstock"  seems, 
however,  to  have  been  a  practiced  and  independent 
dramatist.  His  skill  in  the  use  of  prose  and  of  humor- 
ous relief  contrasts  strikingly  with  the  notable  absence 
of  both  these  elements  in  "Edward  II"  and  "Richard 
II";  while  his  hero,  Woodstock,  though  he  never 
speaks  more  than  passable  verse,  is  in  the  convincing- 
ness and  comprehensiveness  of  his  character  a  more 
promising  tragic  figure,  probably,  than  either  Mar- 
lowe's Edward  or  Shakespeare's  Richard. 

Three  plays  of  Shakespeare's  full  power  complete 
the  roll  of  Elizabethan  historical  tragedies.  "  Macbeth," 

1  Sec  the  preface  to  his  edition  of  the  play  in  the  Shaketpeare 
Jahrbuch,  vol.  xxxv  (1899). 


330  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"Antony  and  Cleopatra,"  and  " Coriolanus,"  all  pro- 
duced within  comparatively  narrow  limits  of  time 
(1606  ?-1610),are  closely  bound  together  by  peculiari- 
ties of  structure  and  by  certain  internal  reminiscences.1 
In  each  the  historical  material  furnished  by  Holinshed 
and  Plutarch  respectively  has  been  shaped  into  a  mar- 
vellous presentation  of  the  ruin  of  a  great  and  noble  na- 
ture by  a  single  besetting  and  ultimately  overwhelm- 
ing weakness;  namely,  ambition,  unworthy  love,  and 
insolent  self-assertion.  Each  of  these  plays  exemplifies 
tragedy  in  its  purest  and  highest  form,  and  the  tragic 
effect  depends  in  each  case  upon  the  wise  interpreta- 
tion of  actual  character  and  historic  fact.  In  "Mac- 
beth," Shakespeare  has  applied  the  narrative  of  Holin- 
shed to  the  inculcation,  in  saner  and  more  sympathetic 
manner,  of  the  same  moral  of  avenging  guilt  which  he 
had  before  read  in  the  history  of  Richard  III.  In  the 
stories  of  Antony  and  Coriolanus,  he  found  his  own 
doctrine  of  the  normal  balance  of  the  world,  and  the 
necessary  punishment  of  what  is  eccentric  and  exor- 
bitant, already  nobly  stated  by  Plutarch;  and  he  has 
been  content  in  these  perfect  tragedies  to  follow  his 
historic  source  with  a  closeness  with  which  he  has  fol- 
lowed no  other. 

To  the  fourth  species  of  history  play  belong  those 
dramas  which,  while  not  subject  to  the  rules  of  ordi- 
nary tragedy  or  comedy,  yet  rise  above  the  level  of  art- 
less improvisation,  and  owe  their  inspiration  to  a  more 
vital  cause  than  purely  melodramatic  effectiveness  or 
mere  ephemeral  appeal.  In  such  plays  there  is  always 
perceptible  behind  the  individual  human  actors  a  back- 

1  Note,  for  example,  the  allusions  to  Plutarch's  Life  of  Antonius  in 
Macbeth,  III,  i,  54-57  and  V,  viii,  1,  2. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  381 

ground  which  presents  a  philosophic  interpretation  of 
history  or  a  general  picture  of  some  great  epoch.  Any 
technical  analysis  of  these  plays  will  find  most  of  the 
examples  lacking  in  unity  and  in  dramatic  intensity. 
But  when  they  are  interpreted  as  delineations  of  His- 
tory itself  rather  than  historic  individuals,  the  reader 
has  no  difficulty  in  explaining  the  singleness  of  aim  and 
effect  which  he  really  feels,  but  which  he  can  hardly 
account  for  by  any  of  the  regular  canons  of  dramatic 
art. 

Perhaps  the  earliest  representative  of  the  type  under 
discussion  is  the  anonymous  "Reign  of  King  Edward 
the  Third,"  published  in  1596  and  acted  probably  sev- 
eral years  before.  Here  the  strong  current  of  national 
feeling,  produced  by  the  general  agitation  which  cul- 
minated in  the  defeat  of  the  Armada,  and  found  expres- 
sion in  the  patriotic  outbursts  of  "Locrine"  (IV,  i,  28- 
43),  of  Falconbridge  in  the  King  John  plays,  and  of 
John  of  Gaunt  in  "Richard  II,"  becomes  the  main  dra- 
matic force  in  the  work.  The  plot,  derived  principally 
from  Holinshed's  Chronicles  of  England  and  Scotland, 
is  totally  lacking  in  dramatic  coherence.  The  introduc- 
tion of  the  scenes  dealing  with  the  Countess  of  Salis- 
bury is  capable  of  satisfactory  explanation  only  when 
we  realize  the  universal  popular  worship  of  Edward  III 
as  the  particular  embodiment  of  England's  glory,  and 
the  half-pagan  reverence  which  would  follow  breath- 
lessly the  career  of  the  divinity  in  peace  as  well  as  war. 
The  military  scenes  themselves  are  quite  disjointed  in 
respect  of  any  progressive  delineation  of  character  or 
the  untying  of  any  specific  dramatic  knot.  The  real 
subject  of  the  play  is  not  Edward  himself  or  his  valiant 
son,  but  the  national  prestige  in  its  steady  progress 


332  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

from  Crecy  to  Poitiers  and  from  Poitiers  to  the  con- 
quest of  Calais.1  So,  the  great  dramatic  moments, 
which  thrill  the  blood  and  give  essential  unity  to  the 
work,  are  not  revelations  of  individual  personality,  but 
high  expressions  of  patriotic  ardor,  such  as  Edward's 
summons  to  his  warriors  after  his  recovery  from  his 
"  follies  seege  against  a  faithful  louer  "  (II,  ii,  201  ff) ;  the 
knighting  and  arming  of  the  Black  Prince  for  the  wars 
(III,  iii,  172 ff);  the  magnificent  tableau  that  brings  in 
the  prince  to  his  father  triumphant  after  Crecy  (III,  v, 
60  ff ) ;  and  the  effective  revulsion  of  the  last  scene,  which, 
straight  on  the  news  of  disaster,  gives  assurance  of  un- 
imagined  victory  and  lowers  the  curtain  on  the  picture 
of  exultant  England. 

During  the  last  three  or  four  years  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  the  type  of  drama  rather  adumbrated  than  ex- 
emplified in  "Edward  III"  was  developed  by  Shake- 
speare into  a  distinct  species  and  illustrated  by  four 
plays  composed  in  close  succession:  the  two  parts  of 
"Henry  IV,"  "Henry  V,"  and  "Julius  Caesar."  The 
Henry  IV  and  Henry  V  plays  form  a  closely  con- 
nected series  presenting  a  well-matured  theory  of  royal 
responsibility  and  governmental  ethics  by  means  of 
their  picture  of  the  character  evolution  of  a  great  na- 
tional leader.  It  is  the  figure  of  the  prince,  as  heir  ap- 
parent, and  as  king,  that  gives  unity  and  purpose  to 
the  trilogy  —  less,  indeed,  as  the  conventional  dramatic 
hero  who  shapes  the  action,  than  as  the  ideal  hypothet- 
ical type  by  which  Shakespeare  illustrates  his  phi- 
losophy of  statecraft  and  kingship. 

1  The  sequence  of  these  events  as  given  in  the  play  varies  from 
that  of  history.  The  battle  of  Crecy  really  occurred  in  1346,  the  sur- 
render of  Calais  in  1347,  the  battle  of  Poitiers  not  till  1356. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  333 

It  can  scarcely  be  doubted  that  the  play  of  "Henry 
V,"  regularly  announced  in  the  Epilogue  to  "Henry 
IV,  Part  II,"  was  definitely  under  contemplation  when 
the  first  part  of  "Henry  IV"  was  conceived.  Indeed, 
an  unnecessary  allusion  in  the  last  act  of  "Richard  II " 
(V,  iii,  1-22)  to  the  young  prince's  "dissolute  and 
desperate"  character,  through  which  Bolingbroke  dis- 
cerns "some  sparks  of  better  hope,  which  elder  years 
May  happily  bring  forth,"  makes  it  probable  that  the 
poet  was  already  considering  the  dramatic  portrayal 
of  this  figure.  It  may  very  reasonably  be  questioned, 
however,  whether,  when  Shakespeare  undertook,  about 
1596  or  1597,  to  follow  up  his  study,  in  Richard  II  and 
Bolingbroke,  of  two  imperfect  and  antagonistic  mo- 
narchic types  by  a  delineation  of  his  ideal  prince,  he  had 
any  idea  of  devoting  more  than  a  single  play  to  that 
prince's  preparation  for  sovereignty  and  another  to  his 
triumphant  reign.  The  second  part  of  "Henry  IV," 
like  the  second  part  of  "Tamburlaine,"  seems  to  be 
an  originally  unpremeditated  addition,  occasioned  by 
the  enormous  effectiveness  of  the  by-figure  of  Falstaff. 
This  genial  character  must  have  expanded  in  its  devel- 
opment far  beyond  the  limits  at  first  intended  for  it, 
and  thus  necessitated  the  splitting  of  the  political 
matter  of  Henry  IV's  reign,  in  itself  hardly  sufficient 
for  a  single  drama,  into  two  plays.  The  result  is  that 
the  serious  historical  theme,  which  certainly  repre- 
sents the  poet's  primary  conception,  is  continually 
being  threatened  with  eclipse  by  the  anachronistic 
comic  scenes  of  sixteenth  -  century  merriment  and 
topical  allusion.  It  is  even  true  that  the  portrayal  of 
the  prince's  preparation  for  government,  besides  being 
thus  thrust  into  the  background,  is  actually  obscured 


334  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

by  the  division.  The  first  play  ends  abruptly  in  order 
to  leave  scope  for  the  second;  yet  much  of  the  second 
part  is  notwithstanding  a  mere  variation  of  material 
already  used  in  the  first;  and  the  effect  of  the  two  parts 
when  taken  together  is  less  that  of  steady  dramatic 
progress  than  of  march  and  counter-march.  The  great 
scenes,  for  example,  which  depict  Falstaff's  arrest  at 
the  suit  of  Dame  Quickly  and  his  impressment  of 
soldiers  in  Gloucestershire  (Part  II,  II,  i;  III,  ii)  are 
brilliant  amplifications  of  suggestions  more  hastily 
and  prodigally  thrown  out  in  the  first  part  (III,  iii, 
60-101;  IV,  ii).  Naturally,  the  tendency  to  repetition 
is  yet  more  striking  in  the  historical  scenes,  where 
actual  scantiness  of  material  could  less  readily  be  eked 
out  by  imagination.  Virtually  everything  necessary 
to  fit  the  Henry  IV  plays  for  their  original  purpose 
as  preliminary  to  a  drama  on  the  reign  of  Henry  V  is 
accomplished  in  the  first  part.  The  triumph  of  the 
prince's  nobler  aspirations  over  the  attractions  of  dis- 
solute company,  his  reconciliation  with  his  father,  and 
the  supreme  vindication  of  his  heroic  valor  in  the  over- 
throw of  Hotspur  are  here  complete.  The  play  needs 
only  scenes  indicating  the  King's  death  and  the  final 
dismissal  of  Falstaff  to  stand  forth  as  we  may  suspect 
it  was  first  designed,  perfect  in  itself  and  a  full  induc- 
tion to  the  treatment  of  the  hero's  triumphant  reign. 
As  it  is,  however,  the  demand  for  more  Falstaff  scenes 
brings  the  prince  back  among  his  old  irresistible  but 
unedifying  companions  with  a  sudden  revulsion  which, 
after  the  exalted  strain  on  which  the  first  part  ends, 
makes  his  character  appear  a  little  weak.  Again  he 
loses  his  father's  confidence,  and  has  this  time  to  regain 
it  by  means  of  declamation  rather  than  action.  Mean- 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  835 

time,  the  memory  of  the  laurels  won  from  Hotspur  at 
Shrewsbury  —  an  episode  intended  surely  as  the  pre- 
lude which  should  usher  in  the  wars  of  France  and 
introduce  the  conqueror  of  Agincourt  —  grows  dim 
through  long  unmartial  acts  where  the  prince  appears 
but  seldom,  and  the  reader's  attention  follows  the 
chicaneries  of  Northumberland  and  Prince  John  or  the 
equally  irrelevant  knaveries  of  Falstaff. 

There  will  hardly  be  found  a  critic  to  wish  for  one 
play  of  "Henry  IV"  instead  of  two.  Falstaff  is  assur- 
edly as  great  a  favorite  with  the  universal  modern 
public  as  he  seems  to  have  been  with  Shakespeare  and 
Queen  Elizabeth.  But  it  is  necessary  to  consider  the 
degree  in  which  this  most  tremendous  of  comic  figures 
probably  affected  Shakespeare's  treatment  of  history, 
in  order  to  gauge  the  intention  of  the  political  scenes 
in  "Henry  IV"  and  to  understand  the  reason  in  part 
also  for  his  abrupt  cutting  off  in  the  pure  history  play 
of  "  Henry  V."  Had  Falstaff  been  dealt  with  as  sum- 
marily as  Mercutio  in  "Romeo  and  Juliet,"  the  trilogy 
we  are  considering  would  have  lost  immeasurably  in 
human  interest,  but  surely  it  would  have  gained  in 
homogeneity.  As  matters  stand,  the  student  of  the 
individual  plays  is  almost  certain,  in  reading  either 
of  the  first  two,  to  be  diverted  from  the  state  of  Plan- 
tagenet  England  to  Shakespeare's  Gloucesterslure  and 
the  streets  of  contemporary  London.  Yet  when  the 
entire  series  is  viewed  comprehensively,  as  it  should 
be,  it  is  not  difficult  to  see  .the  lesson  which  the  poet 
read  behind  the  progress  of  events,  and  which  he  has 
here  intended  to  enforce.  The  moral  of  the  three 
Henry  V  plays  is  that  which  Shakespeare  has  strongly 
expressed  elsewhere:  the  responsibility  of  the  ruler 


336  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

V  both  to  his  subjects  and  to  higher  power.  This  feeling 
inspires  everywhere  Shakespeare's  repugnance  to  any- 
thing amateurish  in  government,  whether  expressed 
in  the  mob-rule  of  Jack  Cade  and  the  Roman  rabble 
or  in  the  anointed  incapacity  of  Richard  II.  But 
though  he  shows  clearly  that  Richard  II  deserved  to 
fall,  he  emphasizes  no  less  strongly,  in  the  prophecies 
of  the  Bishop  of  Carlisle  and  Richard  himself,  and  in 
the  continual  misery  of  the  crowned  Bolingbroke,  that 
an  equal  scourge  afflicts  him  who  by  any  indirection 
seizes  the  royal  burden  with  him  who  seeks  to  escape  it. 
"Henry  IV"  paints  the  gradual  development  in  the 
young  prince  of  the  ideals  of  kingly  service,  capacity, 
justice,  and  patriotic  fervor  which  Shakespeare  de- 
manded of  the  monarch;  and  "Henry  V"  is  a  triumph- 
ant finale,  to  be  considered,  not  separately,  but  in  closest 
connection  with  the  study  in  character  building  which 
it  immediately  followed  and  completed.  As  "Richard 
II"  and  "Henry  IV"  both  demonstrate  the  punish- 
ment of  those  who  trifle  with  royalty,  so  this  play  pic- 
tures the  enormous  possibilities  of  personal  glory  and 
national  service  within  the  reach  of  that  ruler  who 
performs  unshrinkingly  and  thoroughly  the  full  duties 
of  justly  assumed  dominion. 

The  earliest  production  of  "Henry  V"  can  be  as-  ^ 
signed  to  the  summer  of  1599  by  reason  of  the  allusion 
in  the  Prologue  before  the  fifth  act  to  the  Earl  of  Essex's 
absence  in  Ireland  (Apr.  15  -  Sept.  28,  1599) ;  and  all 
evidence  so  far  discovered  tends  to  limit  the  date  of 
"Julius  Cffisar"  to  the  same  year  or  that  which  fol- 
lowed.  The  latter  play  is  Shakespeare's  consummate 
attempt  at  presenting   under   dramatic  form  a  phi-  v 
losophy  of  history;  just  as  "Macbeth,"  "Antony and 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  337 

Cleopatra,"  and  "Coriolanus"  remain  his  most  per- 
fect examples  of  pure  historical  tragedy.  The  remote- 
ness of  the  material  treated  gives  to  all  these  dramas 
a  universal  application  hardly  obtainable  in  the  por- 
trayal of  the  more  immediate  past.  The  main  subject 
of  "Julius  Caesar"  is  not  a  single  figure,  whether  Caesar 
himself  or  Brutus.  It  is  rather  the  vindication  in  the 
rotten  commonwealth  of  Rome  of  the  constant  force  of 
that  political  Nemesis  whose  operation  in  the  course 
of  English  history  Shakespeare  had  already  shown. 
The  play's  claim  to  unity  lies  in  the  singleness  of  pur- 
pose with  which  it  enunciates  the  moral,  already 
exemplified  in  the  career  of  Bolingbroke,  that  every 
effort  to  achieve  law  and  order  by  lawless  means  must 
end  in  futility  and  sorrow.  Caesar,  the  egoist,  and  the 
idealist  Brutus  perish  alike  by  reason  of  their  rash 
attack  upon  the  sacred  power  of  authorized  govern- 
ment, which  in  Shakespeare's  teaching  revenges  every 
attempt  at  tyrannical  or  anarchic  interference.  The 
grim  pathos  and  irony  of  this  play,  one  of  Shakespeare's 
greatest  and  most  thoughtful  works,  lies  mainly  in 
the  swift  inevitable  precision  with  which  Brutus  after 
the  murder  of  Caesar  finds  himself  threatened  by  the 
same  ideals  of  governmental  order  he  has  so  irrespon- 
sibly tried  to  champion.  The  demagogic  Antony  and 
the  Roman  mob  are  blind  instruments  by  which  a  high 
power  pursues  Brutus,  exactly  as  through  him  it  had 
punished  Caesar.  Thus,  the  closing  acts  of  the  play 
have  for  their  main  function  the  development  of 
Brutus's  desperate  realization  that  in  him  and  his 
selfish  companions  are  reproduced  all  the  evils  for 
which  Caesar  fell.1  The  ghost  that  harries  Brutus  is, 
*  Cf.  Julius  Casar.  IV,  iii,  18  ff. 


838  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  course,  in  no  sense  the  spirit  of  one  unjustly  slain., 
seeking  vengeance  upon  the  guilty  murderer.  Such  a 
conception  would  totally  degrade  the  character  of  the 
hero,  and  negative  that  of  Csesar,  whom  Shakespeare 
clearly  follows  Plutarch  in  holding  worthy  of  death. 
Rather,  the  ghost  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  embodi- 
ment of  outraged  authority;  and  Philippi  is  the  scene 
not  of  personal  revenge,  but  of  the  triumph  of  that 
supernal  law  of  ordered  government  which  chastises 
even  in  morally  innocent  and  noble  offenders  every 
movement  subversive  of  the  balance  of  cosmic  serenity. 

In  the.  play  which  most  immediately  followed  "Julius 
Csesar,"  in  "Hamlet,"  Shakespeare  left  the  realm  of 
serious  history.  Here,  however,  he  treated  in  a  mythi- 
cal subject,  and  upon  dramatic  lines  already  laid 
down,  a  not  dissimilar  problem  concerning  the  violent 
putting  right  of  a  world  which  has  grown  out  of  joint. 
Many  of  the  hesitations  and  difficulties  of  the  Prince 
of  Denmark  have  their  origin  in  the  conception  of 
political  and  personal  responsibility  which  Shakespeare 
has  enunciated  in  the  parallel  case  of  Brutus. 

An  enormous  number  of  plays  on  quasi-historical 
subjects,  often  bearing  the  names  of  actual  .personages, 
are  in  reality  mere  compilations  of  traditional  or  in- 
vented romance.  Such,  for  example,  are  the  anony- 
mous "George  a  Greene"  and  "Fair  Em,"  Greene's 
"James  IV,"  and  Dekker's  "Shoemaker's  Holiday." 
Another  instance,  ostensibly  less  irregular,  is  Peele's 
"Famous Chronicle  of  King  Edward  the  First "  (1593), 
a  long  work  distinguished  by  some  fine  bursts  of  un- 
dramatic  poetry,  but  absurd  in  structure  and  in  con- 
tent. Several  of  the  most  extraordinary  violations  of 
history  and  possibility  in  this  play  appear  to  have  been 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  339 

taken  from  a  ballad  called  "A  Warning  Piece  to  Eng- 
land against  Pride  and  Wickedness,"  in  which  Ed- 
ward's queen,  Eleanor  of  Castile,  is  held  up  to  con- 
temporary prejudice  as  a  pattern  of  Spanish  sin  and 
vindictiveness.1  Other  marvellous  episodes  are  wanton 
inventions  of  the  poet,  and  the  play  lacks  little  of 
being,  like  "James  IV,"  a  complete  excursus  into  the 
province  of  fiction. 

The  most  popular  subjects  with  the  fabricators  of 
pseudo-historical  drama  appear  to  have  been  the  tales 
of  pre-Conquest  Britain  and  the  much -storied  age 
of  Richard  I  and  Robin  Hood.  The  heterogeneous 
"Knack  to  Know  a  Knave"  touches  lightly  upon  the 
legends  of  King  Edgar  and  Bishop  Dunstan.  In  the 
anonymous  "Chronicle  History  of  King  Leir  and  his 
Three  Daughters"  and  in  Shakespeare's  "Cymbe- 
line,"  an  admixture  of  spurious  history  gives  weight 
and  coherence  to  the  romantic  scenes  upon  which  both 
plays  mainly  depend  for  their  very  different  degrees  of 
success.  Shakespeare's  "King  Lear"  changes  the  tone  < 
of  its  borrowed  material  from  comedy  to  tragedy  and 
from  romance  to  realism,  without  making  the  his- 
toric element  in  any  way  more  accurate  or  important. 
"Nobody  and  Somebody,"  an  undated  play,  belonging 
probably  to  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
blends  a  realistic  comic  plot  of  contemporary  interest 
with  "the  true  Chronicle  Historic  of  Elydure,  who  was 
fortunately  three  several  times  crowned  King  of  Eng- 
land." So,  Middleton's  "Mayor  of  Queenborough" 

1  It  may  be  that  the  hallad  follows  the  play  instead  of  preceding 
it.  However,  the  question  of  priority  U  not  of  essential  consequence, 
since  both  work*  obviously  express  a  perfectly  general  attitude  of  the 
literature  of  the  day. 


340  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

and  the  pseudo-Shakespearean  "Birth  of  Merlin"  use 
the  shadowy  tissue  of  pre-Arthurian  legend  as  a  back- 
ground for  the  scenes  of  intrigue  comedy  in  which  the 
age  of  James  found  its  highest  amusement.  Similar  in 
spirit  to  the  last  -  mentioned  plays,  and  probably 
roughly  contemporary  with  them,  is  R.  A(rmin  ?)'s 
"Valiant  Welshman"  (1615),  which  likewise  adorns 
the  highly  colored  picture  of  its  hero,  Caractacus 
(Caradoc),  with  the  varied  attractions  of  magical 
superstition,  realistic  burlesque,  and  lurid  melodrama. 

A  different  treatment  of  early  English  history, 
shortly  subsequent  to  the  Conquest,  is  found  in  Dek- 
ker's  interesting  " Satiromastix "  (1602).  Here  the 
author,  after  having  apparently  designed  an  imagina- 
tive tragedy  on  the  subject  of  William  Rufus  and  Sir 
Walter  Tyrrel,  was  led  by  the  exigencies  of  the  "War 
of  the  Theatres"  to  give  the  main  story  a  hasty  comic 
termination,  and  to  interweave  a  satirical  underplot 
dealing  nominally  with  the  Augustan  Age  at  Rome, 
and  really  with  the  no  less  incongruous  literary  dis- 
putes of  the  passing  moment.  Despite  the  bizarre 
mingling  of  three  distant  ages  thus  effected,  and  the 
total  sacrifice  of  plot  unity,  "Satiromastix"  is  still  a 
readable  play  with  genuine  comic  interest.  The  one 
important  tragic  scene l  which  the  drama  contains  in 
its  present  form  is  also  worthy  both  of  Dekker's  high 
reputation  for  pathos  and  of  the  place  which  Charles 
Lamb  gave  it  in  his  "Specimens  of  the  English  Dra- 
matic Poets." 

English  history  during  the  reigns  of  the  Angevin 
kings  had  formed  the  subject,  as  we  have  seen,  of  three 
chronicle  plays  of  the  earliest  type  in  the  two  parts  of 
1  Ed.  Scherer.  11.  2081  S. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  841 

the  "Troublesome  Reign  of  John"  and  in  Shake- 
speare's "King  John."  The  same  epoch  is  portrayed, 
though  with  much  less  emphasis  upon  historic  fact, 
in  the  two  plays  of  "Robert,  Earl  of  Huntington,"  of 
which  the  earlier  certainly  belongs  rather  to  romantic 
comedy  than  to  the  historical  drama. 

The  interesting  comedy  of  "Look  About  You" 
(1600),  treating  the  later  years  of  Henry  II,  is  clearly 
illustrative  of  the  history  play  in  the  stage  of  disinte- 
gration which  we  are  considering.  The  choice  of  title 
in  this  work,  as  well  as  in  "Nobody  and  Somebody," 
shows  how  the  pure  historical  theme  was  losing  at- 
tractiveness on  the  stage  of  1600;  and  the  mixed  plot 
testi6es  alike  to  an  unwillingness  to  stake  the  interest 
of  the  piece  upon  the  frank  presentation  of  chronicle 
material.  "Look  About  You"  is  a  lively  play,  with  a 
superabundance  of  clever  and  exciting  scenes,  hinging 
usually  upon  one  or  another  of  a  great  variety  of  dis- 
guise motives.  It  is,  however,  far  too  confused  in  struc- 
ture and  too  irresponsible  in  purpose  to  merit  the  title 
of  a  good  play  on  any  just  analysis.  It  possesses  sev- 
eral points  of  contact  with  other  plays  dealing  with 
the  same  early  Plantagenet  period.  In  its  portrait 
of  the  page,  "Robin  Hood,  Earl  of  Huntington,"  it 
serves  as  a  prelude  to  the  Huntington  dramas  of  Mun- 
day  and  Chettle;  while  its  treatment  of  the  initial 
stages  in  the  love  affair  between  Prince  Richard  and 
Lady  Falconbridge  brings  it  into  a  like  relation  to  the 
King  John  plays.  The  main  significance  of  "Look 
About  You,"  as  regards  the  history  of  the  chronicle 
play,  lies,  however,  in  the  author's  evident  recogni- 
tion of  the  inadequacy  of  all  these  historical  subjects 
to  hold  the  attention  of  his  audience,  unless  supported 


842  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

by  the  extraneous  farce  and  sensationalism  which  he 
weaves  around  the  figures  of  Skink  and  Gloucester. 

"The  Blind  Beggar  of  Bednal  Green,"  by  Day  and 
Chettle,  is  a  thoroughly  entertaining  play,  which 
makes  very  much  the  same  kind  of  appeal  as  "Look 
About  You,"  and  stands  in  the  same  general  relation 
to  the  facts  of  history.  These  two  comedies  occupy 
an  intermediate  position  between  the  two  dramatic 
classes  into  which  the  chronicle  play  broke,  as  the  type 
lost  its  original  freshness.  In  the  plays  of  the  first  class, 
illustrated  by  "James  IV"  and  "George  a  Greene," 
the  historical  matter  is  essentially  unreal  and  uncon- 
vincing. In  certain  other  decadent  history  plays,  how- 
ever, the  authors  have  found  it  possible  to  transfer  the 
chief  interest  from  the  great  political  events  and  per- 
sonages to  more  romantic  elements,  without  abso- 
lutely falsifying  the  history  of  the  period  in  which  they 
set  their  plots.  It  is  entirely  as  imaginary  comedies 
that  "Look  About  You"  and  "The  Blind  Beggar" 
make  their  appeal.  Yet  the  picture  of  the  troubles 
between  Henry  II  and  his  rebellious  sons  in  the  one 
play,  and  the  picture  of  the  French  wars  of  Henry  VI 
and  the  rivalry  between  Duke  Humphrey  and  Car- 
dinal Beaufort  in  the  other,  are,  on  the  whole,  not 
falsely  painted. 

Better  examples  of  this  type  of  play,  which  subordi- 
nates history,  without  entirely  distorting  it,  are  Sam- 
uel Rowley's  "When  You  See  Me,  You  Know  Me, 
Or  the  famous  Chronicle  History  of  King  Henry  the 
Eight"  and  Dekker's  "Whore  of  Babylon."  Rowley 
gives  a  vivid  sketch  of  informal  life  at  Henry's  court 
by  means  of  scenes  which  in  themselves  are  for  the 
most  part  trivial  or  even  imaginary.  Dekker,  as  his 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  843 

apocalyptic  title  indicates,  satirizes  the  Roman 
Church,  by  presenting  the  chief  occurrences  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign  in  allegorical  drapery. 

Toward  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century,  Shake- 
speare's Company  staged  an  occurrence  in  the  foreign 
history  of  the  previous  generation  in  "A  Larum  for 
London,  or  the  Siege  of  Antwerp."  The  portrayal  of 
the  scenes  attending  the  capture  of  Antwerp  by  the 
Spanish  (1576)  is  reminiscent  of  the  first  part  of  Mar- 
lowe's "  Massacre  at  Paris,"  with  which  this  play  even 
shares  one  phrase.1  But  the  main  attention  of  the 
author  of  the  "Larum"  is  fixed  less  upon  history  itself 
than  upon  two  extraneous  concerns.  With  the  homi- 
letic  intention  suggested  by  the  first  title,  facts  are 
garbled  in  order  to  present  the  Antwerp  disaster  as 
a  retribution  for  civic  short-sightedness;  and  a  large 
fictional  interest  is  added  in  the  portrayal  of  the 
"ventrous  actes  and  valorous  deeds  of  the  lame  sol- 
dier," —  a  popular  type  of  the  day  represented  not 
dissimilarly  in  the  Cavaliero  Dick  Bowyer  of  "The 
Trial  of  Chivalry"  and  in  Ralph  in  "The  Shoemaker's 
Holiday." 

Probably  the  fairest  instances  of  the  late  history 
play  in  its  shift  toward  imaginary  comedy  are  the  four 
dramas  of  Thomas  Heywood  which  deal  with  the 
reigns  of  Edward  IV  and  Elizabeth  respectively.  Hey- 
wood —  a  prose  Shakespeare,  as  Lamb  called  him  — 
has  the  point  of  view  of  the  novelist  rather  than  the 
playwright,  and  in  his  treatment  of  history  he  antici- 
pates strikingly  the  method  of  the  modern  historical 

1  Merely  the  cry  of  the  Second  Spaniard,  "Tue  tue,  tue! "  (ed. 
Simpson,  p.  04).  Cf.  Massacre  at  Parii,  \.  S40.  The  use  of  French  in 
the  former  cose  is  striking. 


344  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

romancer.  In  the  two  Edward  IV  plays,  the  great  per- 
sonages and  the  important  national  events  of  the  reign 
are  pushed  far  into  the  background,  where  they  serve 
to  set  off  the  presentation  of  minor  figures  and  of  inci- 
dents mainly  apocryphal.  Thus,  the  important  subjects 
of  the  work  are  the  adventures  of  the  miller  of  Tarn- 
worth,  of  Mistress  Shore  and  her  abused  husband,  — 
all  excellently  depicted;  the  trifling  episode  of  Falcon- 
bridge's  siege  of  London,  and  the  almost  purely  ima- 
ginary French  campaign.  The  complete  absorption  of 
history  in  fiction  is  interestingly  apparent  when  we 
compare  these  plays,  admirable  in  their  way,  with 
Shakespeare's  handling  of  the  same  period  in  "3  Henry 
VI"  and  "Richard  III."  To  enroll  the  former  works 
among  serious  history  plays  would  be  as  great  an  im- 
pertinence as  to  catalogue  "A  Tale  of  Two  Cities" 
among  the  histories  of  the  French  Revolution. 

The  two  curious  plays  dealing  with  Queen  Eliza- 
beth, to  which  Hey  wood  gives  the  boastful  title,  "If 
You  Know  Not  Me,  You  Know  Nobody,"  have  abso- 
lutely no  connection  in  subject  or  manner.  The  first 
part  takes  up  Tudor  history  just  where  another  form- 
less work  of  the  time,  the  "Sir  Thomas  Wyat"  of 
Dekker  and  Webster,  drops  it.  Heywood  records  the 
troubles  of  the  Princess  Elizabeth  during  the  reign  of 
her  sister  Mary  very  much  in  the  same  spirit  in  which 
Scott  deals  with  the  troubles  of  Amy  Robsart.  The 
long  second  part  of  "If  You  Know  Not  Me"  is  in  no 
proper  sense  historic.  It  resembles  the  same  author's 
"  Four  Prentices  of  London  "  in  being  a  very  far-fetched 
tribute  to  the  London  bourgeoisie;  and  its  loose  plot 
centres  about  the  typical  embodiment  of  citizen  thrift, 
Sir  Thomas  Gresham,  and  his  Royal  Exchange.  The 


THE   HISTORY  PLAY  345 

addition  in  the  last  few  pages  of  a  jaded  account  of  the 
defeat  of  the  Armada  is  obvious  clap-trap. 

After  1600,  the  vogue  of  the  real  history  play  de- 
clined rapidly.  Nearly  the  whole  compass  of  English 
history,  mythical  and  real,  and  all  the  more  effective 
foreign  themes  had  been  brought  upon  the  stage,  and 
the  public  appetite  was  glutted.  Henceforth  the  his- 
toric title  practically  vanishes,  and  the  chronicles  are 
searched  only  for  purely  romantic  matter.  The  latest 
examples  of  the  true  English  history  play  are  probably 
the  incongruous  "Life  of  Henry  the  Eighth,"  com- 
posed about  1613 l  by  Fletcher  in  conjunction  with  L 
Shakespeare,  and  John  Ford's  historical  tragedy  of 
"Perkin  Warbeck."2 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

GENERAL    DISCUSSION 

Schelling,  F.  E.,   The  English  Chronicle  Play.   A  Study  in  the 
Popular  Historical  Literature  environing  Shakespeare,  1902. 

INDIVIDUAL   TEXTS 
A.  EXPERIMENTAL  CHRONICLE  PLATS  OP  MIXED  TYPB 

1.    PLAYS   DEALING  WITH   FOREIGN   HISTORY 

MARLOWE,  CHRISTOPHER  :  Tamburlaine,  Parts  I  and  II.  See 
bibliography,  p.  254. 

The  Massacre  at  Paris.    "  With  the  Death  of  Guise."  Un- 
dated octavo,  "  E.  A.  for  Edward  White." 

1  The  accuracy  of  this  date  has  been  ineffectively  disputed.  See 
K.  Elze,  Sh.  Jb.,  ix  (1874),  55-80,  who  argues  in  favor  of  1603. 

2  From  the  foreign  field  it  is  possible   to   add  the  anonymous 
tragedy  of  Sir  John  Van  Olden  liarnattclt,  ascribed    in   part   to 
Fletcher,  and  Chapman's  Wars  of  Pompcy  and  Caesar  (1G31),  and 
Tragedy  of  Chabot  (1639). 


346  THE   TUDOR   DRAMA 

The  Jew  of  Malta.  See  bibliography,  p.  228. 

LODGE,  THOMAS  :  The  Wounds  of  Civil  War.  "  Liuely  set 
forth  in  the  true  Tragedies  of  Marius  and  Scilla,"  1594.  Re- 
printed, W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  vii.  Discussion :  R.  Carl, 
"  Uber  Thomas  Lodge's  Leben  und  Werke,"  Anglia,  x  (1888), 
235-288.  (Separately  printed  as  Halle  diss.,  1887.) 

PEELE,  GEORGE  :  The  Battle  of  Alcazar,  "  fought  in  Barbarie, 
betweene  Sebastian  king  of  Portugall,  and  Abdelmelec  king 
of  Marocco.  With  the  death  of  Captaine  Stukeley,"  1594. 
Reprinted,  Dyce,  Peele's  Works. 

GREENE,  ROBERT  ?  :  The  First  Part  of  the  Tragical  Reign  of 
Selimus,  "sometime  Emperour  of  the  Turkes,  and  grand- 
father to  him  that  now  raigneth,"  1594.  Re-issued  1638, 
"  Written  T.  G."  Reprinted,  A.  B.  Grosart,  Greene's  Works, 
vol.  xiv.  Separately  reprinted,  A.  B.  Grosart,  Temple  Drama- 
tists, 1898.  Discussion :  C.  Crawford,  "  Spenser,  Locrine,  and  Se- 
limus," 9  Notes  and  Queries,  vii  (1901) ;  reprinted,  Collectanea, 
First  Series  (1906),  47-100  ;  P.  A.  Daniel,  Athenceum  3677, 
Apr.  16,  1898 ;  H.  Gilbert,  R.  Greene's  Selimus,  Kiel,  1899. 

2.    PLATS    DEALING  WITH  ENGLISH  HISTORY 

The  Troublesome  Reign  of  John  King  of  England.  Two 
parts,  1591.  Other  editions  :  1611,  "  Written  by  W.  Sii.,"  and 
1622,  "Written  by  W.  Shakespeare."  Reprinted,  W.  C. 
Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's  Library,  vol.  v,  1875.  Discussion:  G.  C. 
Moore  Smith,  "Shakespeare's  King  John  and  the  Trouble- 
some Reign,"  Furnivall  Miscellany  (1901),  335  ff. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM  :  King  John.  First  printed  in  the  1623 
Folio. 

The  Life  and  Death  of  Jack  Straw,  "  A  notable  Rebell  in 
England:  Who  was  kild  in  Smithfield  by  the  Lord  Maior  of 
London,"  1593.  Reprinted,  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  v. 

The  True  Tragedy  of  Richard  the  Third,  1594.  Reprinted,  B. 
Field,  Shakespeare  Society,  1844;  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's 
Library,  v,  1875.  Discussion:  G.  B.  Churchill,  "Richard  III 
bis  Shakespeare,"  Palcestra,  x  (1900). 

The  Famous  Victories  of  Henry  the  Fifth,  "  containing  the 
Honourable  Battell  of  Agiu-court,"  1598.  Facsimile,  1887. 
Reprinted,  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's  Library,  v,  1875. 

1  Henry  VI.  First  printed  in  the  Shakespeare  Folio,  1623. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  347 

2  Henry  VI.   Extant  in  three  versions. 

(a)  "  The  First  Part  of  the  Contention  betwixt  the  two  fa- 
mous Houses  of  Yorke  and  Lancaster,  with  the  death 
of  the  good  Duke  Humphrey,"  1594.  Reprinted  (two 
impressions?),  1000.  Modern  editions:  J.  O.  Halliwell, 
Shakespeare  Society,  1843;  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Shakespeare' i 
Library,  v,  1875.  Facsimile,  C.  Pnetoriui,  1889. 

(ft)  Slightly  altered  version  (with  Part  III)  in  "The  Whole 
Contention  betweene  the  two  Famous  Houses,  Lancaster 
and  Yorke."  Undated,  but  shown  by  continuous  pagi- 
nation to  be  contemporary  with  the  1619  edition  of  Per- 
icles. Facsimiles,  1886. 

(c)  Expanded  and  improved  text  in  the  Shakespeare  Folio, 
1623. 

3  Henry  VI.  Extant  in  three  versions. 

(a)  "  The  True  Tragedie  of  Richard  Duke  of  Yorke,  and  the 

death  of  good  King  Heurie  the  Sixt  .  .  .  acted  by  the 
Right  Honourable  the  Earl  of  Pembrooke  his  seruants," 
1595.  Facsimile,  1891.  Reprinted  1600.  Modern  edi- 
tions; see  2  Henry  VI  (a). 

(b)  Slightly  altered  version  in  "The   Whole  Contention" 

(1619).  See  2  Henry  VI  (b). 

(c)  Expanded  and  improved  text  in  the  Shakespeare  Folio, 

1623.  Discussion :  E.  Malone,  "  Dissertation  on  the 
Three  Parts  of  King  Henry  VI,"  Boswell's  Malone,  xviii, 
1821;  R.  Grant  White,  "  Essay  on  the  Authorship  of 
King  Henry  the  Sixth,"  Shakespeare,  vol.  vii,  1859; 
Miss  Jane  Lee,  Trans.  New  Sh.  Soc.,  1875-76,  219-312. 

B.  BIOOBAPHICAL  CHBONICLE  PLATS 

Sir  John  Oldcastle.  "  The  first  part  of  the  true  and  honour- 
able historic  of  the  life  of  Sir  John  Oldcastle,  the  good  Lord 
Cobham,"  1600.  Reprinted,  C.  F.  T.  Brooke,  The  Shakespeart 
Apocrypha;  P.  Simpson,  Malone  Society.  Another  version, 
"  Written  by  William  Shakespeare."  Dated  1600,  but  printed, 
probably,  in  1619.  Reprinted,  J.  R.  Macarthur,  1907.  Forother 
editions,  see  bibliography  in  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha.  Dis- 
cussion :  R.  S.  Forsythe,  "  Certain  Sources  of  Sir  John  Old- 
castle," Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xivi  (1911),  104-107. 

Thomas  Lord  Cromwell.  "  The  True  Chronicle  Historic  of 


348  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  whole  life  and  death  of  Thomas  Lord  Cromwell.  .  .  . 
Written  by  W.  S."  Reprinted  1613,  and  in  the  third  and 
fourth  Shakespeare  Folios,  1664  and  1685.  For  modern  edi- 
tions, see  bibliography  in  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 

Stukeley:  "The  Famous  Historye  of  the  life  and  death  of 
Captaine  Thomas  Stukeley.  With  his  marriage  to  Alderman 
Curteis  Daughter,  and  valiant  ending  of  his  life  at  the  Battaile 
of  Alcazar,"  1605.  Reprinted,  R.  Simpson,  The  School  of 
Shakspere,  vol.  i,  1878. 

Sir  Thomas  More.  MS.  in  British  Museum,  Harleian  7368. 
Facsimile,  J.  S.  Farmer.  Printed,  A.  Dyce,  Shakespeare  Society, 
1844;  A.  F.  Hopkinson,  1902  ;  C.  F.  T.  Brooke,  The  Shake- 
speare Apocrypha.  Discussion :  R.  Simpson,  "  Are  there  any 
extant  MSS.  in  Shakespeare's  Handwriting  ?  "  4  Notes  and 
Queries,  viii  (1871),  1  ff  ;  J.  Spedding,  "  Shakespeare's  Hand- 
writing," 4  Notes  and  Queries,  x  (1872),  227;  J.  Spedding,  Re- 
views and  Discussions,  1879,  "  On  a  Question  concerning  a 
Supposed  Specimen  of  Shakespeare's  Handwriting." 

C.  HISTORICAL  TRAGEDIES 

MARLOWE,  CHRISTOPHER  :  Ed-ward  II,  1594.  Probably  first 
printed  in  1593.  Reprinted  1598,  1612,  1622.  For  later  edi- 
tions, see  list  in  Oxford  edition  of  Marlowe,  1910,  p.  312. 

MARLOWE  and  NASH  :  The  Tragedy  of  Dido  Queen  of  Car- 
thage. "  Written  by  Christopher  Marlowe  and  Thomas  Nash," 
1594.  Reprinted,  Hurst,  Robinson  and  Co.,  The  Old  English 
Drama,  1825;  all  editions  of  Marlowe;  editions  of  Nash  by 
Grosart  (1885)  and  R.  B.  McKerrow,  vol.  ii,  1904. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM:  The  Tragedy  of  King  Richard  the 
Third,  1597.  Reprinted  1598,  1602,  1605,  1612,  1622,  1629, 
1634.  Altered  version  in  the  Shakespeare  Folio,  1623.  Dis- 
cussion :  J.  Spedding,  "  On  the  Corrected  Edition  of  Richard 
III,"  Transactions  New  Shakspere  Society,  1875-76,  1-75. 

The  Tragedy  of  King  Richard  the  Second,  1597.  Reprinted 
1598.  Later  editions,  adding  the  abdication  scene,  1608  (two 
issues),  1615,  1634.  Corrected  version  in  the  Shakespeare 
Folio,  1623. 

Macbeth.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 

Antony  and  Cleopatra.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 

Coriolanus.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  34ft 

The  Tragedy  of  "Woodstock.  MS.  in  British  Museum  (Eger- 
ton  1954).  Printed,  J.  O  Halliwell,  1870  (11  copies); 
W.  Keller,  Shakespeare  Jahrbuch,  xxxv  (1899),  3-121. 

JONSON,  BENJAMIN  :  Sejauus  his  Fall,  1605.  Reprinted  in  the 
first  Jonsou  Folio,  1616. 
Catiline  his  Conspiracy,  1611.    Reprinted  in  1616  Folio. 

CHAPMAN,  GEORGE:  The  Conspiracy  and  Tragedy  of  Charles 
Duke  of  Biron,  Marshal  of  France.  Two  Parts.  1608.  Re- 
printed 1625. 

Sir  John  Van  Olden  Barnavelt.  MS.  in  British  Museum 
(Add.  18653).  Printed,  A.  H.  Bullen.  Old  Plays,  ii,  1883. 

The  Tragedy  of  Nero.  "  Newly  Written,"  1624.  Reprinted,  A. 
H.  Bullen,  Old  Plays,  i,  1882  ;  Mermaid  series,  1888. 

FORD,  JOHN  :  The  Chronicle  History  of  Perkin  Warbeck, 
1634.  Reprinted,  Ford's  Works,  Mermaid  edition. 

(For  several  other  possible  members  of  this  class,  see  bibliogra- 
phy to  chapter  vi,  p.  228  f .) 

D.  HISTORY  PLAYS  OP  PHILOSOPHIC  IMPORT 
The  Reign  of  King  Edward   the  Third,  1596  ;    reprinted 
1599.  For  later  editions  and  criticism,  see  The  Shakespeare 
Apocrypha. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM.  The  History  of  Henry  the  Fourth. 
Part  I,  1598.  Other  editions  1599,  1604,  1608,  1613,  1622, 
1632,  1639  ;  Shakespeare  Folio,  1623. 

The  Second  Part  of  Henry  the  Fourth,  "  continuing  to  his 
death  and  coronation  of  Henrie  the  fift,"  1600  (two  issues). 
The  Chronicle  History  of  Henry  the  Fifth.  "  With  his  bat- 
tell  fought  at  Agin  Court  in  France,"  1600.  Reprinted  1602, 
1608.  More  accurate,  fuller  text  in  Shakespeare  Folio,  1623. 
Julius  Caesar.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 

E.  ROMANTICIZED  HISTORY  PLAYS 

I.   PLAYS    IN    WHICH    THE    HISTORICAL    ELEMENT    IS    IMAGINARY 
OR    INSIGNIFICANT 

PEELE,  GEORGE  :  Edward  the  First.  "  With  bis  returne  from 
the  holy  land.  Also  the  life  of  Lleuellen,  it-bell  in  Wales. 
Lastly,  the  sinking  of  Queene  Elinor,"  1593.  Reprinted  in 
Dyce's  editions  of  Peele.  See  bibliography,  p.  254. 


350  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

A  Knack  to  Know  a  Knave,  1594.  Cf.  p.  146. 

GREENE,  ROBERT  :  The  Scottish  History  of  James  the 
Fourth,  1598.  Cf.  p.  293. 

George  a  Greene,  the  Pinner  of  Wakefield,  1599.  Cf .  p.  293. 

The  True  Chronicle  History  of  King  Leir  and  his  Three 
Daughters,  1594.  Another  edition,  1605.  Reprinted,  W.  C. 
Hazlitt,  Shakespeare's  Library;  Sidney  Lee,  Shakespeare  Clas- 
sics, 1909. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM  :  King  Lear,  1609.   Another  edition 
bearing  same  date,  but  probably  printed  in  1619.  Altered  text 
in  1623  Folio. 
Cymbeline.  First  printed  in  the  1623  Folio. 

DEKKER,  THOMAS:  Old  Portunatus,  1600.  Ed.  H.  Scherer, 
Munchener  Beitrage,  xxi  (1901). 

The  Shoemaker's  Holiday,  "  Or,  The  Gentle  Craft.  With 
the  humorous  life  of  Simon  Eyre,  shoemaker,  and  Lord 
Maior  of  London,"  1600.  Other  editions,  1610, 1618, 1624, 
1631,  1657. 

Satiromastix,  "  Or  the  untrussing  of  the  Humorous  Poet," 
1602.  See  bibliography  on  p.  388. 

Nobody  and  Somebody.  "  With  the  true  Chronicle  Historic 
of  Elydure,  who  was  fortunately  three  seueralt  times  crowned 
King  of  England,"  n.  d.  Reprinted,  Glasgow,  1877  (50  copies) ; 
R.  Simpson,  The  School  of  Shakspere,  vol.  i,  1878. 

The  Valiant  Welshman,  "  Or  The  True  Chronicle  History 
of  the  life  and  valiant  deedes  of  Caradoc  the  Great,  King  of 
Cambria,  now  called  Wales,"  1615.  Another  edition,  1663. 
"  Written  by  R.  A.  Gent." 

MIDDLETON,  THOMAS  :  The  Mayor  of  Queenborough,  1651. 
Reprinted  in  the  Mermaid  and  other  editions  of  Middleton. 

ROWLEY,  WILLIAM  (and  SHAKESPEARE  ?) :  The  Birth  of  Mer- 
lin: Or,  the  Child  hath  found  his  Father.  "  Written  by 
William  Shakespear  and  William  Rowley,"  1662.  See  bibli- 
ography in  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 

H.    PLAYS  IN  WHICH  GENUINE  HISTORIC  INTEREST  IS  BLENDED 
WITH  INTERESTS  OF  OTHER  KINDS 

Look  About  You,  1600.    Reprinted,  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  Dodsley, 

vii. 
HEYWOOD,  THOMAS  :  King  Edward  the  Fourth.  Two  Parts, 


THE  HISTORY  PLAY  351 

1600.  Other  editions,  1605,  1613,  1619,  1626.  Reprinted,  B. 
Field,  Shakespeare  Society,  1842. 

If  You  Know  Not  Me,  You  Know  Nobody,  "  Or,  The 
troubles  of  Queene  Elizabeth."  Part  1.  1605.  Other  edi- 
tions, 1606,  1608,  1610,  1613,  1623,  1632,  1639.  Part  II. 
"  With  the  building  of  the  Royal  Exchange  :  And  the  famous 
Victoria  of  Queene  Elizabeth,  in  the  Yeare  1588,"  1606. 
Other  editions,  1609, 1623  ?,  1632.  Reprinted  (both  parts), 
J.  P.  Collier,  Shakespeare  Society,  1851. 

A  Lamm  for  London  ;  or  the  Siege  of  Antwerp,  1602. 
Reprinted,  R.  Simpson,  The  School  of  Shakspere,  No.  1,  1872. 
ROWLEY,  SAMUEL  :  When  You  See  Me,  You  Know  Me, 
"Or  the  famous  Chronicle  Historic  of  king  Henry  the  eight," 
1605.  Other  editions,  1613,  1621,  1632.  Reprinted,  K.  Elze, 
1874. 

DEKKER,  THOMAS,  and  WEBSTER,  JOHN  :  The  Famous  History 
of  Sir  Thomas  Wyat.  "  With  the  Coronation  of  Queen 
Mary,  and  the  coming  in  of  King  Philip,"  1607.  Another 
edition,  1612.  Reprinted,  editions  of  Dekker  (1873)  and  Web- 
ster (1830,  1857,  1877).  Discussion  :  F.  E.  Pierce,  "The  Col- 
laboration of  Webster  and  Dekker,"  Yale  Studies  in  English, 
1909. 

DEKKER,  THOMAS:  The  Whore  of  Babylon,  1607. 
DAY,  JOHN  :  The  Blind  Beggar  of  Bednal  -  Green,  "  with 
The  merry  humor  of  Tom  Strowd  the  Norfolk  Yeoman," 
1659.  Reprinted,  A.  H.  Bollen,  The  Works  of  John  Day,  1881, 
vol.  ii. 


CHAPTER  X 

DRAMA   OF   CONTEMPORARY   INCIDENT 

THE  abnormal  conditions,  sketched  at  the  beginning 
of  the  last  chapter,  which  fostered  the  sudden  vogue, 
about  1590,  of  the  rude  history  play,  stimulated  the 
growth  of  another  type  of  drama  similarly  possessed 
of  ephemeral  attractiveness,  and  equally  capable  of 
hasty  collaborative  production.  During  the  sixteen 
years  between  1592,  when  "Arden  of  Feversham"  was 
published,  and  1608,  when  "A  Yorkshire  Tragedy" 
first  appeared  in  print,  at  least  nine  dramas  are  re- 
corded, which  derive  their  subject  from  contemporary 
murders;  and  this  number  can  easily  be  raised  to  a 
dozen  by  the  inclusion  of  several  problematical  mem- 
bers of  the  species. 

The  reasons  for  this  prolific  exemplification,  during 
the  last  years  of  the  sixteenth  century  and  the  first 
years  of  the  seventeenth,  of  a  peculiar  dramatic  genre 
hardly  to  be  found  before  or  after  are  the  same  for  the 
murder  plays  as  for  the  cruder  efforts  in  the  staging 
of  history.  The  former  type,  like  the  other,  could  be 
produced  with  great  speed,  and  demanded  in  general 
little  originality  of  conception  or  treatment.  They 
were  furthermore  recommended  by  the  powerful  box- 
office  consideration  that  the  gruesome  matter  they 
handled  maintained  a  peculiarly  strong  hold  upon  the 
minds  of  the  Elizabethan  public.  How  strong  this  hold 
was  no  one  will  require  to  be  told  who  has  glanced  over 
the  entries  for  the  period  in  the  Stationers'  Register, 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    353 

or  is  conversant  with  any  branch  of  the  current  litera- 
ture of  the  time.  Ballad  broadsides,  chronicles,  and 
homilies  all  testify  to  an  unusually  lively  interest  in 
murders  and  scaffold  eloquence.  A  very  good  instance 
of  this  trend  of  the  sensational  journalism  of  the  day 
is  Anthony  Munday's  "View  of  Sundry  Examples. 
Reporting  many  straunge  murthers,  sundry  persons 
periured,  Signes  and  tokens  of  Gods  anger  towards  us 
—  And  all  memorable  murthers  since  the  murther  of  ' 
Maister  Saunders  by  George  Browne  to  this  present 
and  bloody  murther  of  Abell  Bourne,  Hosyer,  who 
dwelled  in  Newgate  Market,  1580."  l  The  Chronicles 
of  Holinshed  and  Stow,  the  great  historical  reposi- 
tories of  the  epoch,  are  full  of  tales  of  recent  homicide, 
reported  with  the  most  serious  care;  and  it  is  only 
natural  that  the  dramatic  tyros,  who  searched  their 
pages  for  material,  did  not  discriminate  more  closely 
than  the  authors  themselves  between  true  history  and 
vulgar  horror. 

Of  the  known  murder  plays  —  merely  a  small  frac- 
tion, probably,  of  the  total  output  of  the  period  —  a 
number  survive  only  in  the  mention  of  "Henslowe's 
Diary."  Such  are  "  Page  of  Plymouth  "  by  Jonson  and 
Dekker,  acted  in  1599;  "Cox  of  Collumpton,"  by 
Day  and  Haughton,  1599;  two  parts  of  "The  Black 
Dog  of  Newgate,"  by  Day,  Smith,  Hathway,  and  an- 
other poet,  1602-1603;  probably  also  the  two  parts  of 
"Black  Bateman  of  the  North,"  1598,  in  which  Chet- 
tle,  Dekker,  Drayton,  and  Wilson  were  all  concerned. 
The  precise  subject  of  the  last  work  is  not  certain,  but 

1  This  curious  treatise  was  reprinted  by  J.  P.  Collier  as  an  appen- 
dix to  his  edition  of  Munday's  John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber, 
Sltakeapearc  Society,  1851. 


854  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  others  all  dealt  with  notorious  crimes  of  the  day. 
and  they  show  Henslowe  at  his  usual  practice  of  em- 
ploying a  number  of  low-salaried  hacks  in  the  rapid 
preparation  of  theatrical  "shockers."  In  the  case  of 
"The  Black  Dog  of  Newgate,"  it  would  seem  that  the 
manager  did  not  even  know  the  name  of  one  of  the 
authors,  whom  he  refers  to  four  times  as  "  the  other 
poet,"  —  apparently  somebody  called  in  at  a  pinch  to 
help  Day,  Smith,  and  Hathway. 

"Page  of  Plymouth,"  which  Henslowe  mentions  in 
August,  1599,  is  interesting  because  it  gives  us  a 
glimpse  of  Ben  Jonson  within  two  years  after  his  first 
appearance  among  dramatic  writers.  The  entry  reads : 
"Lent  vnto  wm  Borne  alles  birde  the  10  of  aguste  1594 
to  Lend  vnto  bengemyne  Johnsone  &  thomas  deckers 
in  earneste  of  ther  boock  wch  they  [are]  a  writtenge 
called  pagge  of  p[le]moth  the  some  —  xxxxs."  Eight 
pounds  was  the  entire  amount  paid  for  the  work,  that 
being,  on  Henslowe's  niggardly  scale,  the  full  aver- 
age price  of  a  drama.  The  theme  is  a  revolting  story 
of  wifely  infidelity  and  assassination,  very  similar  to 
those  treated  in  "Arden  of  Feversham"  and  "A  Warn- 
ing for  Fair  Women."  l 

The  Black  Dog  of  Newgate  was  a  widely  infamous 
character,  one  Luke  Hutton,  —  son,  it  has  been  said,  or 
cousin,  of  the  Archbishop  of  York.  Executed  in  1598 
for  repeated  highway  robberies  and  for  other  crimes, 
he  impressed  himself  upon  the  public  mind  by  his 
"Lamentation,"  of  which  a  very  doubtful  version  is 
preserved  among  the  Roxburghe  Ballads;  (vol.  ii,  ff 

1  A  ballad  and  a  prose  tract  dealing  with  the  Plymouth  murder 
have  survived.  See  an  article  on  "The  Story  of  Page  of  Plymouth  " 
in  The  Shakespeare  Society's  Papers,  vol.  ii,  1845. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    355 

318,  319):  "Luke  Buttons  Lamentation,  which  he 
wrote  the  day  before  his  Death,  being  condemned  to 
be  hang'd  at  York,  for  his  robberies  and  trespasses 
committed  thereabouts.  To  the  Tune  of  wandering 
and  wavering." l 

Four  typical  murder  plays  remain  intact:  "Arden 
of  Feversham"  and  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women," 
powerful  anonymous  dramas  both  of  which  have  been 
ascribed  to  Shakespeare,  though  in  the  latter  case  upon 
entirely  negligible  grounds;  "A  Yorkshire  Tragedy," 
of  which  the  earliest  edition  bears  on  its  title-page  the 
bold  assertion,  "Written  by  W.  Shakespeare";  and 
the  very  curious  work  called  "Two  Tragedies  in  One," 
which  claims  for  its  author  an  elusive  Robert  Yaring- 
ton. 

The  earliest  of  these  plays  is  "Arden  of  Feversham," 
the  greatest  tragedy  of  the  group,  which  was  licensed 
April  3,  1592,  and  printed  in  the  same  year  with  an 
amply  descriptive  title-page:  "The  Lamentable  and 

1  The  ballad  commences:  — 

"  I  am  a  poor  Prisoner  condemned  to  die 

ah  wo  is  me,  wo  is  me,  for  my  great  folly. 

Fast  fettered  in  Irons  in  place  where  I  lye 

be  warned  young  wantons,  hemp  passeth  green  holly. 

My  parents  were  of  good  degree 

By  whom  I  would  not  ruled  be 

Lord  Jesus  receive  me,  with  mercy  relieve  me, 
Receive,  O  sweet  Saviour,  my  Spirit  unto  thee." 

There  are  twenty-two  such  stanzas,  and  two  pictures  in  the  original 
broadside  in  the  British  Museum.  See  also  the  "woeful  Ballad 
made  by  Mr.  George  Mannynton  an  houre  before  he  suffered  at 
Cambridgr-castell,"  entered  on  the  Stationers'  Register,  Nov.  7, 
1576,  and  parodied  in  the  " Repentance "  of  Quicksilver  in  "East- 
ward Hoe." 


366  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

True  Tragedie  of  M.  Arden  of  Feversham  in  Kent. 
Who  was  most  wickedlye  murdered,  by  the  meanes  of 
his  disloyall  and  wanton  wyfe,  who  for  the  loue  she 
bare  to  one  Mosbie,  hyred  two  desperat  ruffins  Black- 
will  and  Shakbag,  to  kill  him.  Wherin  is  shewed  the 
great  mallice  and  discimulation  of  a  wicked  womman, 
the  vnsatiable  desire  of  filthie  lust  and  the  shamefull 
end  of  all  murderers."  The  crime  portrayed  occurred 
in  1551,  more  than  a  generation  before  the  play  can 
have  been  composed,  but  all  the  circumstances  were 
still  fresh  in  the  people's  memory.  Holinshed,  whose 
narrative  the  dramatist  follows,  pauses  in  his  Chron- 
icle to  devote  six  great  folio  pages,  double  columned 
and  closely  printed,  to  the  atrocity.  The  plot  of  the 
play  does  not  unfold  itself  according  to  dramatic  rules; 
yet  it  holds  the  attention  notwithstanding.  The  first 
four  acts  are  taken  up  with  successive  attempts  upon 
the  life  of  the  unsuspecting  Arden,  who  escapes  always 
by  some  unlocked  for  accident,  till  finally  stabbed  in 
his  own  house  at  the  beginning  of  Act  V.  The  rest  of 
the  last  act  pictures  the  discovery  and  condemnation 
of  the  murderers.  Upon  this  unpromising  framework, 
the  author  of  "Arden  of  Feversham"  has  built  up  a 
tragedy  of  coarse  but  mighty  passion,  which  several 
distinguished  critics  have  believed  Shakespearean, 
but  which  there  is  better  reason  now  for  supposing  to 
be  the  latest  and  finest  work  of  Kyd.1  The  play  con- 
tains several  splendid  declamatory  speeches,  three  or 
four  fine  scenes  of  dialogue  and  action,  and  a  rude 
colossal  figure  in  Arden's  wife,  which,  though  some- 
times unpardonably  vulgar  and  altogether  without  the 

1  See   Charles   Crawford,    Shakespeare  Jahrbuch,  xxxix   (1903), 
74-8G.  Reprinted,  Collectanea,  1st  Series  (1906),  101  ff. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    357 

touch  of  romantic  pathos  inherent  in  the  evil  charac- 
ters of  great  ideal  poets,  yet  shows  itself  the  work  of  a 
vigorous  hand. 

The  second  of  the  extant  murder  tragedies  was 
printed  in  1599  as  lately  acted  by  the  Lord  Chamber- 
lain's (Shakespeare's)  Company,  and  with  the  follow- 
ing title:  "A  Warning  for  Faire  Women,  containing 
The  most  Tragicall  and  Lamentable  Murther  of  Mas- 
ter George  Sanders,  of  London,  Marchant,  nigh  Shoot- 
ers Hill;  consented  vnto  by  his  owne  wife,  acted  by 
M.  Browne,  Mistris  Drewry  and  Trusty  Roger,  agents 
therin:  with  their  seuerall  ends."  The  murder  of 
George  Sanders  took  place  in  1573,  and  in  the  same 
year  there  appeared  a  circumstantial  account  of  the 
whole  matter  in  a  pamphlet  of  some  twenty  pages, 
followed  by  Stow  and  Holinshed  as  well  as  by  the 
author  of  the  play.1  Another  mention  of  the  crime 
occurs  in  Munday's  "View  of  Sundry  Examples,"  from 
which  an  illustrative  quotation  may  be  pardoned,  be- 
cause, to  my  mind,  it  indicates  how  murder  stories 
established  themselves  in  the  imagination  of  the  people 
and  gained  a  permanent  foothold  in  literature.  The 

1  The  pamphlet  is  reprinted  in  Simpson's  School  of  Shakspcrt, 
vol.  ii.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  play  is  based  directly  upon 
the  pamphlet,  and  not  upon  the  chronicles.  Note,  for  example,  the 
following  parallel.  After  the  arrest  of  the  persons  suspected  of 
complicity  in  Sanders's  death,  Mistress  Drury  tells  Mistress  Sanders, 
according  to  the  pamphlet,  "that  .  .  .  she  was  fully  determined 
not  to  dissemble  any  longer,  nor  to  hazarde  liir  owne  soule  eternally 
for  the  safetie  of  another  bodies  temporal!  life."  The  author  of  the 
play  merely  versifies,  and  writes  (II.  1571-1573):  — 

"Should  I,  to  purchase  safety  for  another, 
Or  lengthen  out  another's  temporal!  life, 
Hazard  mine  owne  soule  everlastingly  ?" 


358  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

original  pamphlet  and  the  chronicles  give  merely  the 
facts  as  they  occurred,  plus  a  certain  amount  of  moral- 
izing. Munday  hardly  cites  any  facts  at  all,  —  appar- 
ently the  story  was  already  well  known,  —  but  he  uses 
the  circumstance  of  Browne's  crime  and  punishment 
as  a  point  of  departure  for  a  vast  quantity  of  euphu- 
istic  fine  writing.  The  murder,  that  is  to  say,  had  risen 
out  of  the  plane  of  current  journalism  into  that  of 
belles-lettres.  Munday  writes :  — 

"Not  long  since,  one  George  Browne,  a  man  of  stat- 
ure goodly  and  excellent,  if  lyfe  and  deedes  thereto 
had  beene  equivalent;  but  as  the  auncient  adage  is, 
goodly  is  he  that  goodly  dooth,  and  comely  is  he  that 
behaveth  himself  comely,  so  may  it  be  witnessed  in 
this  man,  who  more  respected  a  vaine  pride  and  prodi- 
gall  pleasure,  which  remayned  in  his  person,  then  com- 
mendation and  good  report  that  followeth  a  godly 
and  vertuous  life.  But  nowe  a  dayes  everie  courageous 
cutter,  euerie  Sim  Swashbuckler,  and  everie  desperate 
Dick,  that  can  stand  to  his  tackling  lustely,  and  be- 
have him  selfe  so  quarrelously  that  he  is  ashamed  of  all 
good  and  honest  company,  he  is  a  gallant  fellowe,  a 
goodly  man  of  his  handes,  and  one,  I  promise  you,  that 
as  soone  comes  to  Tyburne  as  euer  a  one  of  them  all. 
.  .  .  But  he  [Browne]  a  wretch,  more  desirous  of  his 
death  then  wylling  his  welfare,  more  mindfull  of  mur- 
ther  then  savegard  of  his  soule,  so  bent  to  blindnesse, 
that  he  expected  not  the  light,  strooke  the  stroke  that 
returned  his  shame,  dyd  the  deede  that  drove  him  to 
destiny,  and  fulfilled  the  fact,  that  in  the  end  he  found 
folly.  O,  minde  most  monstrous!  O,  heart  most  hard! 
O,  intent  so  yrksome!  whome  neyther  preferment 
might  perswadc,  rytches  move  to  regard,  affection 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    359 

cause  to  respect,  former  freendship  force  to  fancie,  nor 
no  vertue  of  the  mimic  seeme  too  satisfie.  Where  was 
the  bonds  of  loyaltie  ?  where  was  the  regard  of  hon- 
estie?  Where  was  the  feare  of  the  Almightie?  where 
was  the  care  of  Christianitie  ?  or  where  was  the  hope  of 
eternall  felicitie  ?  and  last,  where  was  thy  duty  to  God, 
thy  Prince,  and  countrey  ?" 

The  most  striking  difference  between  "Arden  of 
Feversham"  and  the  "Warning  for  Fair  Women"  lies 
in  the  greater  comprehensiveness  of  the  latter  play. 
"Arden"  begins  abruptly  with  the  immediate  prepara- 
tion for  the  catastrophe,  and  nothing  is  treated  in  de- 
tail except  the  repeated  attempts  upon  the  hero's  life 
and  his  accidental  escapes.  The  other  drama  presents 
the  whole  story  from  the  first  meeting  of  Browne  and 
Mistress  Sanders  through  the  formation  and  execu- 
tion of  the  plot  to  the  final  discovery,  trial,  and  con- 
demnation of  all  the  guilty  parties.  The  finest  por- 
tions of  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women"  are  those  which 
depict  the  remorse  of  the  culprits  after  the  murder  has 
been  committed.  Browne's  sudden  terror  as  he  hears 
the  dying  words  of  Sanders  is  well  portrayed;  and  the 
most  impressive  scene  of  the  play  is  certainly  that  in 
which  Browne  comes  red-handed  to  meet  his  accom- 
plice, the  dead  man's  wife.  The  bold  interposition  of 
Sanders's  young  son  and  his  childish  games  in  the 
midst  of  the  bitter  recriminations  of  the  murderers 
shows  a  keen  sense  of  the  dramatic  and  no  small  know- 
ledge of  human  nature. 

The  author  of  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women,"  like 
the  author  of  "Arden  of  Feversham,"  saw  clearly  the 
great  fault  of  this  kind  of  drama,  —  the  small  oppor- 
tunity, namely,  in  such  chronicles  of  particular  inci- 


360  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

dents  for  the  representation  of  broader  and  more  uni- 
versal feelings.1  The  last  lines  of  the  "Warning"  voice 
an  appeal  to  the  audience  to 

"  Beare  with  this  true  and  home-borne  Tragedy, 
Yeelding  so  slender  argument  and  scope 
To  build  a  matter  of  importance  on, 
And  in  such  forme,  as,  happly,  you  expected. 
What  now  hath  fail'd  to-morrow  you  shall  see 
Perform'd  by  History  or  Comedy." 

"Arden  of  Feversham"  ends  in  the  same  strain: — 

"  Gentlemen,  we  hope  youle  pardon  this  naked  Tragedy, 
Wherin  no  filed  points  are  foisted  in 
To  make  it  gratious  to  the  eare  or  eye; 
For  simple  truth  is  gratious  enough, 
And  needes  no  other  points  of  glosing  stuff e." 

There  is  more  in  this  than  the  usual  mock-modesty 
of  the  epilogue.  The  effort  to  visualize  the  sordid  de- 
tails of  contemporary  crime  must  of  necessity  clip  the 
wings  of  Tragedy.  "Arden"  and  the  "Warning  for 
Fair  Women"  are  faithful  dramatizations  of  specific 
atrocities,  never  rising  for  more  than  a  few  speeches 
into  the  rarefied  universal  atmosphere  which  surrounds 
the  whole  of  Shakespeare's  murder  plays,  "  Macbeth  " 
and  "Othello";  and  this  fact  is  perhaps  the  one  abso- 
lute, incontrovertible  proof  that  Shakespeare  can  have 
had  no  important  part  in  the  composition  of  either. 
In  these  two  plays,  however,  the  inevitable  faults  of 
their  class  are  palliated  by  the  truth  and  brilliance  of 
individual  scenes. 

1  The  prefatory  dialogue  in  the  Warning  for  Fair  Women  and  the 
epistle  prefixed  to  George  Whetstone's  Promos  and  Cassandra  (1578) 
are  probably  the  most  important  pieces  of  dramatic  criticism  to  be 
found  in  any  English  stage  play  previous  to  1600. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT     361 

The  composition  of  murder  tragedies  appears  to 
have  been  very  largely  instrumental  in  teaching  the 
Elizabethan  playwrights  the  dramatic  capabilities  of 
the  life  about  them.  Both  the  works  I  have  discussed 
abound  in  topical  allusions  giving  to  many  of  their 
scenes  a  delightful  savor  of  sixteenth-century  Eng- 
land, and  bearing  witness  at  the  same  time  to  the  rise 
of  that  trend  of  realistic  self-absorption  which  reached 
a  head  about  1610,  and  which  makes  many  of  the 
Jacobean  plays  starve  the  romantic  reader  to  glut  the 
antiquary.  In  one  of  the  dramas  before  us  we  see 
Arden  and  his  friend  Franklin  go  off  to  take  a  turn  or 
two  in  Paul's  before  supping  at  the  eighteen-penny 
ordinary.  We  see  the  stalls  before  the  church  and  the 
apprentices  in  charge,  and  learn  of  the  "ould  filching" 
which  is  likely  to  occur  "when  the  presse  comes  foorth 
of  Paules." l  We  hear  of  Gadshill  robberies  and  devices 
for  cutting  purses;  and  before  the  play  ends  we  find 
ourselves  intimately  acquainted  with  the  manner  of 
life  of  the  cut-throats,  Black  Will  and  Shakebag.  The 
domestic  economy  of  Arden's  household  in  town  and 
country  is  very  fully  pictured;  and  this  is  one  of  the 
few  plays  in  which  gentlemen  exchange  convincingly 
the  small  gossip  of  the  week  or  trivial  dinner  invita- 
tions. In  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women,"  the  Queen's 
court  at  Greenwich  is  repeatedly  mentioned,  ahd  one 
scene  offers  a  charming  glimpse  of  the  courtiers^drink- 
ing  in  the  buttery,  where  ale  is  dispensed  as  bounty 
to  all  comers.  The  dark  side  of  the  life  of  the  day  is  por- 
trayed with  equal  sincerity  by  the  peasant,  Old  John, 
when  he  discovers  Sanders's  body :  "  What  an  age  live 
we  in !  when  men  have  no  mercy  of  men  more  than  of 
1  Cf.  Arden  of  Feverskam,  II,  ii,  53,  54. 


362  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

dogges,  bloudier  than  beasts !  This  is  the  deed  of  some 
swaggering,  swearing,  drunken,  desperate  Dicke.  Call 
we  them  Cabbaleers  ?  masse,  they  be  Canniballes,  that 
have  the  stabbe  readyer  in  their  handes  than  a  penny 
in  their  purse.  Shames  death  be  their  share." 

The  curious  work  called  "Two  Lamentable  Trage- 
dies," or  "Two  Tragedies  in  One,"  was  published  in 
1601  with  the  name  of  Robert  Yarington  on  the  title- 
page.  As  the  heading  implies,  this  production  con- 
sists of  two  separate  plots  not  in  any  way  connected, 
except  that  a  scene  of  the  one  alternates  ordinarily 
with  a  scene  of  the  other.  The  more  poetical  division 
of  the  work  concerns  an  Italian  version  of  the  Babes 
in  the  Wood  story,  and  has  been  conjecturally  re- 
garded as  standing  in  some  relation  to  Chettle's  non- 
extant  "Orphans'  Tragedy,"  for  which  Henslowe 
made  several  payments  in  1599.  The  other  part, 
which  more  directly  concerns  the  present  subject, 
dramatizes  the  murder,  in  August,  1594,  of  Robert 
Beech,  a  London  merchant,  and  his  apprentice, 
Thomas  Winchester,  by  an  avaricious  neighbor 
named  Merrey.  It  is  usual  to  connect  this  portion  of 
the  work  in  some  sort  with  an  anonymous  "Beeches 
Tragedy,"  licensed  for  acting  in  January,  1600,  and 
with  the  "tragedy  of  Merie"  mentioned  by  Henslowe 
about  the  same  time  as  by  Day  and  Haughton.  Of 
Robert  Yarington,  the  proclaimed  author,  nothing 
whatever  is  known. 

As  preserved,  this  motley  play  is  far  the  worst  of  the 
extant  murder  tragedies,  and  it  constitutes  a  glaring 
example  of  the  disaster  which  follows  the  effort  to 
deck  out  coarse  realistic  material  in  a  style  of  false  and 
pretentious  refinement.  In  agreement  with  the  more 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    363 

moderate  practice  of  "A  Warning  for  Fair  Women," 
the  writer  imbeds  his  double  plot  in  a  complex  alle- 
gorical framework  after  the  archaic  manner  of  Kyd's 
"Soliman  and  Perseda,"  thus  adding  a  third  incon- 
gruous element  to  his  piece  in  a  series  of  didactic  dia- 
logues between  Homicide,  Avarice,  and  Truth..  Yar- 
ington's  style  tends  everywhere  toward  ridiculous 
inflation;  and  it  would  perhaps  not  be  easy  to  find 
a  happier  instance  of  misapplied  and  self-convicted 
pomposity  than  the  words  with  which  a  neighbor  greets 
the  recovery  of  the  head  and  legs  of  the  dismembered 
Beech: — 

"  They  are  the  same;  alas,  what  is  become 
Of  the  remainder  of  this  wretched  man  ?  " 

With  this  affectation  in  language  is  strongly  con- 
trasted the  excessive  crudity  of  the  play  in  all  matters 
of  dramatic  arrangement.  Several  of  the  stage  direc- 
tions are  of  high  value  in  marking  the  limits  of  naivete 
tolerated  in  Elizabethan  realistic  presentation.  Thus, 
we  read:  "Then  Merry  must  passe  to  Beeches  shoppe, 
who  must  sit  in  his  shop  and  Winchester  his  boy  stand 
by  " ;  and  later,  "  Then  being  in  the  upper  Rome  [room] 
Merry  strikes  him  in  the  head  fifteene  times."  In  this 
scene,  the  spectator  is  required  to  conceive  Merry 
first  as  in  his  own  shop.  He  must  then  imagine  him 
going  to  visit  his  neighbor  Beech,  entering  the  latter's 
shop,  bringing  him  back  to  his  own  house,  taking  him 
indoors  and  up  to  his  garret,  and  beating  his  brains 
out,  coram  popido,  with  fifteen  blows  of  a  hammer. 

The  last  great  crime  of  Shakespeare's  age  which 
received  theatrical  attention,  and  the  most  widely 
bruited,  probably,  of  all,  occurred  in  1605.  It  is  thus 
described  in  Stow's  Chronicle:  "Walter  Callverly 


364  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  Calverly  in  Yorkshire  Esquier,  murdred  2  of  his 
young  children,  stabbed  his  wife  into  the  bodie  with 
full  purpose  to  have  murdred  her,  and  instantly  went 
from  his  house  to  have  slaine  his  youngest  child  at 
nurse,  but  was  prevented.  For  which  fact  at  his  triall  in 
Yorke  hee  stood  mute  and  was  judged  to  be  prest  to 
death,  according  to  which  judgment  he  was  executed 
at  the  castell  of  Yorke  the  5th  of  August  [1605]." 

Upon  this  ghastly  affair  were  founded  two  plays: 
"A  Yorkshire  Tragedy,"  published  in  1608,  and 
George  Wilkins's  "Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage," 
which  appeared  in  the  previous  year  "as  it  is  now 
playd  by  his  Majesties  Servants."  The  latter  drama 
possesses  an  accidental  interest  as  the  only  play 
known  to  have  been  written  independently  by  the 
obscure  person  who,  according  to  the  usually  received 
opinion,1  collaborated  with  Shakespeare  in  "Peri- 
cles." Though  printed  a  year  earlier  than  the  "York- 
shire Tragedy,"  the  other  play  was  almost  certainly 
composed  later.  The  title-page  of  the  first  quarto  tells 
us  that  the  "Miseries"  was  even  then  (1607)  being 
performed  by  the  King's  Men;  and  the  imaginative 
liberties  taken  with  the  course  of  events  and  with  the 
characters  would  indicate  that  the  period  of  writing 
stood  removed  a  couple  of  years  from  the  bleak  reality. 
"  A  Yorkshire  Tragedy,"  on  the  other  hand,  bears  every 
mark  of  hasty  and  nearly  contemporaneous  work. 
The  author  of  the  latter  play  would  appear  not  to  have 
known  the  names  of  the  figures,  and  to  have  been 

1  See,  however,  D.  L.  Thomas's  argument  against  Wilkins's 
authorship  of  Pericles,  Engl.  Stud.,  39  (1908),  210-239,  where  inter- 
esting evidence  is  offered  in  favor  of  ascribing  the  play  to  Shake- 
speare and  Thomas  Heywood. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    365 

acquainted  with  only  the  bare  outline  of  the  catas- 
trophe, while  standing  far  too  near  the  facts  to  venture 
upon  any  such  artistic  elaboration  as  we  find  in  the 
"Miseries."  The  brief  "Yorkshire  Tragedy"  is  occu- 
pied almost  solely  with  the  murders  themselves  and 
their  punishment,  adding  but  casual  glimpses  of  the 
Husband's  first  love  affair,  his  family  connection,  and 
London  prodigality.  It  is  just  these  last  points  that  the 
"Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage"  dwells  upon;  and 
when  taken  together  the  two  plays  give  a  fairly  com- 
prehensive view  of  the  situation. 

Everything  about  the  "Yorkshire  Tragedy"  points 
to  the  same  hasty  assortment  of  miscellaneous  and  ill- 
digested  material  which  Yarington's  "Two  Tragedies 
in  One"  exemplifies.  The  first  page  of  the  original 
edition  is  headed:  "All's  One,  or,  One  of  the  Foure 
Plaies  in  One,  called  A  York-shire  Tragedy,  as  it  was 
Plaid  by  the  Kings  Maiesties  Plaiers."  The  most  rea- 
sonable inference  from  this  passage  is  that  three  inde- 
pendent or  vaguely  connected  sets  of  additions  had 
been  employed  in  order  to  fill  out  to  the  compass  re- 
quired for  stage  purposes  the  brief  impromptu  treat- 
ment of  the  murder,  which,  as  preserved,  extends  to 
something  less  than  the  average  length  of  two  acts. 
When  it  came,  three  years  later,  to  printing,  the  ex- 
traneous matter  was  omitted.  It  is  worth  noting  that 
the  company  which  in  1607  was  actually  performing 
"The  Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage"  is  the  same 
which  had  performed  the  "Yorkshire  Tragedy,"  — 
presumably  in  1605,  when  interest  in  the  Calverley 
murders  was  strongest.  It  is,  therefore,  very  probable 
that  the  play  of  Wilkins  represents  a  thorough  literary 
adaptation  of  the  original  "Four  Plays  in  One,"  de- 


866  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

signed  to  secure  continued  currency  for  the  work  after 
the  temporary  appeal  due  to  sensational  curiosity  had 
subsided.  Wilkins  may  have  retained  in  altered  form 
some  of  the  earlier  matter  in  the  "Four  Plays";  but 
as  he  discarded  the  tragic  conclusion,  the  original 
treatment  of  the  murders  would  seem  to  have  been 
left  intact,  to  find  separate  publication  just  after  the 
appearance  of  the  improved  text. 

In  versification,  in  character  delineation,  and  in  the 
general  absence  of  human  sympathy,  "A  Yorkshire 
Tragedy  "  is  a  work  of  the  low  dramatic  level  which  the 
occasion  and  purpose  of  its  composition  would  lead  one 
to  expect.  The  impudent  claim  of  Shakespearean 
authorship  must,  along  with  several  other  instances 
of  premeditated  fraud,  be  laid  heavily  to  the  charge 
of  its  ill-reputed  publisher,  Thomas  Pavier.  Yet  the 
play  does  contain  three  or  four  passages  of  prose  strik- 
ingly superior  to  all  the  rest,  and  characterized  by  an 
uncanny  play  of  fancy  which  recall  the  porter  scene 
in  "Macbeth"  and  the  morbid  brilliance  of  the  sup- 
posedly Jonsonian  additions  to  "The  Spanish  Trag- 
edy." These  few  speeches  are  perhaps  not  glaringly 
unworthy  of  Shakespeare,  nor  very  different  from 
what  he  might  have  written,  had  he  stood  by  with  the 
proverbial  penful  of  ink,  and  chosen  to  give  a  mo- 
ment's attention  to  the  miserable  piece  of  sloppy 
sensationalism  which  his  company  were  demeaning 
themselves  to  perform.  To  accept  this  possibility  is 
merely  to  reduce  the  charge  against  Pavier  from  un- 
complicated mendacity  to  equivocation. 

Technically  considered,  "The  Miseries  of  Enforced 
Marriage"  hardly  belongs  to  the  group  of  contempo- 
rary murder  plays.  Wilkins  has  altered  the  names  of 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    367 

his  characters,  added  many  imaginary  figures,  and 
has  substituted  a  happy  conclusion  for  the  revolting 
butchery  of  reality,  by  causing  his  intending  murderer 
to  repent  at  the  latest  possible  moment.  The  connec- 
tion of  this  tragi-comedy  with  the  Calverley  affair, 
first  pointed  out  by  Mr.  P.  A.  Daniel  in  1879, 1  is,  how- 
ever, indisputable;  and  the  play  affords  an  excellent 
instance  of  the  tendency,  everywhere  manifesting  itself 
at  the  beginning  of  the  seventeenth  century,  to  pass 
from  the  rude  dramatization  of  specific  contemporary 
events  to  the  imaginative  portrayal  of  general  real- 
istic conditions.  Here  one  can  see  the  writer  actually 
in  process  of  bridging  the  gap  between  unpolished 
works  of  concrete  incident,  like  "Arden  of  Fever- 
sham,"  and  those  great  critical  analyses  of  current 
manners  of  which  Jonson's  "Bartholomew  Fair"  is 
possibly  the  most  masterly  example.  The  considera- 
tion of  "The  Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage"  belongs, 
therefore,  hardly  less  to  the  next  chapter  than  to  the 
present.  Quite  mediocre  in  the  essentials  of  plot  and 
poetic  finish,  this  piece  yields  to  few  Jacobean  plays  in 
the  life-likeness  of  its  characters.  Nearly  all  the  dra- 
matis personcs  come  direct  from  the  streets  and  tav- 
erns of  contemporary  London,  and  the  comedy  of  the 
time  possesses  few  more  successful  type-portraits  than 
those  of  the  shrewd  and  honest  old  family  servant 
Butler,  and  the  gentleman-gamester  IKord. 

Thomas  Heywood's  "Woman  Killed  with  Kind- 
ness," written  in  1603,  illustrates  in  a  different  manner 
the  tendency  to  employ  material  projxjr  to  the  murder 
play  for  the  purposes  of  more  catholic  art.  Up  to  the 
middle  of  Act  IV,  the  relations  between  Frankford, 
1  Athenaum,  Oct.  4,  N7o.  *710. 


368  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Mistress  Frankford,  and  Wendoll  run  parallel  to  the 
state  of  affairs  in  "Arden  of  Feversham"  and  "A 
Warning  for  Fair  Women."  The  admirable  picture, 
moreover,  of  the  management  of  Master  Frankford's 
household  repeats  the  most  characteristic  merit  of  the 
latter  plays.  But  Heywood  had  too  much  both  of  the 
moralist  and  the  artist  to  give  his  drama  the  hideous 
termination  which  the  earlier  poets  had  taken  over 
from  the  history  of  crime.  The  situation,  which  in  the 
murder  plays  led  to  the  cold-blooded  assassination  of 
the  injured  husband,  is  made  by  Heywood  to  result 
in  the  exposure  and  remorseful  anguish  of  the  evil- 
doers. The  portrayal  of  Mistress  Frankford's  feelings 
and  fate  from  the  time  of  her  wearied  acquiescence  in 
the  sin  which  she  has  come  to  loath  (IV,  iii,  ad  fin.)  is  a 
triumph  of  imaginative  art.  Yet  the  imagination  of  the 
poet  clearly  takes  its  flight  from  the  basis  of  realistic 
sympathy  which  the  murder  plays  had  created.  How 
much  Heywood  owes  in  this  part  of  the  play  to  his 
humbler  predecessors  in  the  same  theme  becomes  evi- 
dent when  we  contrast  the  scenes  dealing  with  Mis- 
tress Frankford  with  the  shallow  and  insincere  under- 
plot of  Acton  and  Mountford. 

"The  Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage"  and  "A 
Woman  Killed  with  Kindness"  thus  make  it  clear  that 
the  class  of  murder  tragedies,  however  transitory  in 
itself,  yet  left  the  English  theatre  a  legacy,  both  in 
comedy  and  in  tragedy,  which  was  permanent.  The 

i  glaring  atrocities,  which  first  drew  the  eyes  of  the  ruder 

playwrights  to  the  life  about  them,  soon  lost  their 
zest;  but  in  the  meantime  their  study  had  enriched  the 
drama  with  several  new  trends  of  sympathy  and 
observation. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT     8C9 

It  is  by  no  means  to  be  supposed  that  the  murder 
plays  constitute  the  sole  evidence  of  the  tendency  of 
the  Elizabethan  popular  stage,  about  the  close  of  the 
century,  to  treat  matters  of  local  and  current  rather 
than  universal  application.  The  plays  we  have  dis- 
cussed make  up  the  most  readily  distinguished  and 
probably  the  best  preserved  group  of  dramas  based  on 
contemporary  incident;  but  any  comparison  of  the- 
atrical and  social  history  between  1580  and  1610  shows 
the  drama  of  the  age  permeated  everywhere  by  tangled 
threads  of  topical  allusion,  now  unfortunately  only 
partially  and  doubtfully  explainable.  It  is,  indeed, 
unsafe  and  uncritical  to  regard  every  average  play  of 
the  epoch  as  a  definite  historical  document,  and  to 
seek,  as  many  have  sought,  to  trace  each  one  back  to 
some  particular  occurrence  of  the  time.1  Yet  no  stu- 
dent can  afford  to  overlook  the  logical  connection  be- 
tween the  ephemeral  interests  of  the  Elizabethan  pub- 
lic and  the  work  of  those  playwrights  whose  function 
it  was  to  be  the  public's  entertainers  in  ordinary. 
From  the  time  of  "Gorboduc"  and  "Gammer  Gur- 
ton's  Needle"  onward,  the  evolution  of  the  drama 
was  very  largely  a  matter  of  the  origin,  development, 
and  absorption  of  theatrical  fashions,  each  closely 
interpretative  of  some  phase  of  the  general  popular 
life.  "Gorboduc"  itself  is  an  "occasional"  play,  com- 
posed in  view  of  a  particular  political  situation, 
and  intended  to  stimulate  the  Queen  to  speedy 
care  of  the  royal  succession.  So,  the  court  comedies 
of  Lyly  arc  nearly  all  in  some  degree  parables 
of  fashionable  history,  and  depend  for  their  elucida- 

1  The  most  notable  exponents  of  this  dangerous  tendency  in  crit> 
arc  Hichard  Simpson  and  the  lute  Mr.  Fleay. 


370  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tion  upon  the  proper  understanding  of  momentary 
conditions. 

Under  normal  circumstances,  it  is  true,  particularly 
on  the  public  stage,  the  plays  possessing  the  elements 
of  permanent  success  were  those  in  which  local  appeal 
was  almost  entirely  obliterated  in  a  higher  and  more 
catholic  view  of  art.  Yet  even  in  these  works  the  pul- 
sation of  current  thought  and  gossip  can  often  be  felt; 
and  any  great  public  excitement  was  likely  in  this  age 
to  obtain  immediate  and  undisguised  expression  on 
the  popular  stage.  Besides  the  constant  tendency  of 
the  theatres  to  keep  pace  with  the  vulgar  curiosity  con- 
cerning spectacular  crime  and  the  great  flare  of  na- 
tional ardor  which  the  Armada  year  produced,  two 
great  controversies  of  the  day  extended  themselves 
to  the  drama  and  became  important  factors  in  the- 
atrical history.  The  one  was  the  famous  Martin 
Marprelate  dispute  of  1588-1590;  the  other  the  "War 
of  the  Theatres,"  which  culminated  about  the  year 
1600. 

None  of  the  dramatic  texts  called  forth  by  the  Mar- 
prelate  agitation  have  survived.  The  probability  is 
that  they  were  all  coarse  impromptus  which  trusted 
for  their  effect  rather  to  farcical  action  and  clownish 
caricature  than  to  any  regularly  developed  plot.  As 
might  naturally  be  assumed,  it  appears  to  have  been 
exclusively  the  anti-Martinist,  Episcopal  party,  which 
handled  this  un-Puritanical  weapon  of  stage  satire. 
The  controversy  itself  broke  out  in  1588,  but  the  first 
suggestion  of  its  transference  to  the  theatres  occurs 
in  Nashe's  "Countercuff  Given  to  Martin  Junior" 
(August,  1589),  where  allusion  is  made  to  "The  Anato- 
mie  latclie  taken  of  him,  the  blood  and  the  humors  that 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT     371 

were  taken  from  him,  by  launcing  and  worming  him  at 
London  vpon  the  common  stage."  l 

In  regard  to  the  mode  of  treatment,  we  have  only 
a  few  hints  of  burlesque  scenes,  such  as  one  in  which 
"Vetus  Comoedia"  brought  in  the  lady  Divinity  with 
her  face  scratched  and  her  stomach  nauseated  by  the 
lawless  attacks  of  Martin.2  The  controversial  im- 
portance attached  to  these  works  is  indicated  by  the 
apparent  necessity  of  legal  interference,3  and  by 
Lyly's  fervent  ejaculation  in  the  anti-Martinist  tract, 
"  Pap  with  a  Hatchet " :  "  Would  those  Comedies  might 
be  allowed  to  be  plaid  that  are  pend,  and  then  I  am 
sure  he  [Martin]  would  be  decyphered,  and  so  perhaps 
discouraged."  * 

The  militant  tendencies  of  the  English  stage  be- 
tween 1588  and  1591  were  not  exclusively  employed 
in  religious  or  political  controversy.  That  personal 
satire  was  also  rampant  appears  from  a  famous  sen- 
tence in  Greene's  preface  to  "Perimedes  the  Black- 
smith" (1588):  "I  keepe  my  old  course,  to  palter  vp 
some  thing  in  Prose,  vsing  mine  old  poesie  still,  Omne 
tulit  punctum,  although  latelye  two  Gentlemen  Poets 
made  two  madmen  of  Rome  beate  it  out  of  their  paper 
bucklers;  and  had  it  in  derision,  for  that  I  could  not 
make  my  verses  iet  vpon  the  stage  in  tragicall  bus- 
kins." And  then,  after  several  ill-natured  innuendoes 
against  Marlowe  and  another  poet,  Greene  returns  to 

1  Cf.  Nashe's  Works,  ed.  R.  B.  McKerrow,  i,  59. 

1  PcuquH's  Return,  Nashe,  ed.  McKerrow,  i,  92. 

1  See  Collier,  ed.  1879,  i,  264,  for  the  text  of  the  Lord  Mayor'* 
letter  of  November,  1589,  relative  to  the  suppression  of  all  plays  in 
the  city  by  reason  of  the  "mislike"  of  the  Master  of  the  Revels. 

4  Cf.  Lyly's  Works,  ed.  Bond,  iii,  408. 


372  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

his  special  cause  of  anger:  "If  I  speake  darkely,  Gen- 
tlemen, and  offend  with  this  digression,  I  craue  par- 
don, in  that  I  but  answere  in  print  what  they  haue 
offered  on  the  Stage." l 

The  so-called  "War  of  the  Theatres,"  or  "Poeto- 
machia,"  as  Dekker  terms  it,  arose  just  ten  years  later 
than  the  Marprelate  discussion.  This  second  con- 
troversy has  left  far  more  important  dramatic  evi- 
dences than  the  other,  though  it  is  probable  that  it 
bulked  much  the  smaller  in  the  eyes  of  the  contem- 
porary public.  The  limits  of  this  theatrical  war, 
which  involved  Ben  Jonson  and  certain  rival  poets  by 
him  denominated  "Poetasters,"  have  been  unjustifi- 
ably extended  by  Fleay  and  his  followers.  All  state- 
ments about  the  affair  need  careful  weighing. 

The  permanently  important  results  of  the  war  were 
the  production  in  very  close  succession,  about  the 
middle  of  the  year  1601,  of  two  great  plays:  Jonson's 
"Poetaster"  and  Dekker's  "Satiromastix."  These 
comedies  were  acted  in  confessed  rivalry  by  rival  com- 
panies, —  Jonson's  by  the  Children  of  her  Majesty's 
Chapel,  by  whom  his  previous  play  of  "Cynthia's 
Revels"  had  been  presented;  Dekker's  by  Shake- 
speare's company  and  by  the  Children  of  Paul's.  In 
each  case  the  sole  or  main  object  was  personal  satire. 
"The  Poetaster"  closes  with  a  distinct  expression  of 
Jonson's  determination  not  to  proceed  in  the  con- 
troversy; 2  and  there  is  in  fact  no  reason  to  believe  that 

1  Greene's  Works,  ed.  Grosart,  vii,  7,  8. 

1  See  the  Apologetical  Dialogue  spoken  "only  once"  as  an  epi- 
logue on  the  first  production  of  the  play  (Mermaid  ed.,  375  ff). 
This  dialogue  was  omitted  from  the  1602  edition  because  of  legal 
restraint,  but  was  restored  in  the  1G16  Folio. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    373 

the  quarrel  was  continued  after  1601,  otherwise  than 
in  a  few  vague  allusions. 

The  earlier  history  of  the  dispute  is  not  so  clear. 
Yet  it  seems  possible  to  reach  the  truth  in  all  essen- 
tials, if  we  are  willing  to  abandon  pure  speculation  and 
accept  at  their  face  value  the  statements  of  the  two 
main  combatants,  both  of  whom  appear  to  be  per- 
fectly sincere.  Jonson  asserts,  in  the  Apologetical 
Dialogue  affixed  to  "The  Poetaster,"  that  his  oppo- 
nents had  provoked  him  for  three  years  "with  their 
petulant  styles  On  every  stage,"  till  "at  last  unwilling, 
But  weary,  I  confess,  of  so  much  trouble,"  he  resolved 
to  "try  if  shame  could  win  upon  'hem."  He  thus  sug- 
gests that  "The  Poetaster"  was  his  first,  as  well  as  his 
last,  effort  at  satire  against  individuals. 

Dekker,  on  the  other  hand,  says,  in  the  Preface  to 
"Satiromastix,"  that  Jonson,  or  Horace,  "question- 
less made  himself  believe  that  his  Burgonian  wit  might 
desperately  challenge  all  comers,  and  that  none  durst 
take  up  the  foils  against  him";  and  he  adds  that  if 
"an  Inquisition  should  be  taken  touching  this  lamen- 
table merry  murdering  of  Innocent  Poetry,"  the  verdict 
"  would  be  found  on  the  Poetasters'  side  Se  defendendo," 
though,  as  he  admits,  "Notwithstanding,  the  Doctors 
think  otherwise." 

It  is  easy  to  reconcile  the  two  statements.  Jonson 
was  doubtless  quite  justified  in  stating  "The  Poetaster  " 
to  be  his  first  overt  attack  upon  his  fellow  dramatists. 
With  the  exception  of  the  skit  on  Anthony  Munday  as 
Antonio  Balladino  in  the  first  scene  of  "The  Case  is 
Altered "  —  an  incidental  bit  of  ridicule  apparently 
unconnected  with  the  question  in  hand  —  I  do  not 
believe  that  any  of  Jonsoii's  comedies  previous  to 


374  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

"The  Poetaster"  contained  satirical  matter  which  a 
contemporary  audience  would  have  applied  to  any 
active  dramatist  of  the  day. 

The  attempt  to  explain  various  figures  in  "Every 
Man  in  his  Humor,"  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor," 
and  "Cynthia's  Revels"  as  distinct  travesties  of 
Daniel,  Munday,  Marston,  Dekker,  and  other  poets, 
though  very  variously  maintained,  leads  only  to  con- 
flicting results,  and  seems  to  me  inherently  uncritical. 
Jonson's  satire  is  direct  and  bold.  In  view  of  the  ex- 
quisite cleverness  and  clearness  of  his  caricatures  of 
Munday  in  "The  Case  is  Altered"  and  of  Marston  and 
Dekker  in  "The  Poetaster,"  it  is  inconceivable  that  he 
could  be  guilty  of  the  vague  and  pointless  gibes  which 
Fleay  and  Penniman  attempt  to  find  in  the  three  other 
plays. 

Moreover,  each  of  these  three  plays  just  alluded  to 
has  a  purpose  entirely  distinct  from  the  ridicule  of 
individuals;  and  the  various  characters  introduced  are 
all  delineated  in  accordance  with  this  general  purpose. 
"Every  Man  in  his  Humor,"  a  comedy  of  light  in- 
trigue and  social  types,  requires  its  "town  gull,"  Mas- 
ter Matthew,  for  the  sake  of  atmosphere,  just  as  it 
requires  Captain  Bobadill,  the  " Paul's  Man";  and  no 
trait  in  either  figure  can  justly  be  credited  to  any  other 
source  than  the  artistic  demands  of  the  imaginary  plot.1 

"Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor"  has,  of  course,  a 
definitely  satiric  aim,  but  the  mark  of  Jonson's  ridi- 

1  There  appears  to  be  no  support  for  the  idea  of  Fleay  and  Penni- 
man that  the  poet  Daniel  is  satirized  as  Master  Matthew  and  Fas- 
tidious Brisk  in  Jonson's  Every  Man  plays  and  as  Emulo  in  Patient 
Grisscll.  For  a  discussion  of  the  latter  work  (by  Dekker,  Chettle, 
and  Haughton)  and  its  slight  possible  connection  with  the  theatrical 
war,  see  the  next  chapter,  p.  409  f. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    375 

cule  is  here  never  the  single  individual.  Rather,  the 
spectators  are  promised  in  the  Prologue 

"  a  mirror, 

Where  they  shall  see  the  time's  deformity 
Anatomized  in  every  nerve  and  sinew." 

This  promise  is  faithfully  kept.  By  means  of  such 
varied  type  figures  as  Sordido,  Fungoso,  Deliro,  Carlo 
Buffone,  and  Fastidious  Brisk,  Jonson  holds  up  to 
reprehension  the  follies  of  all  contemporary  life, 
whether  in  country,  city,  or  court.  That  he  should 
have  been  willing,  in  the  midst  of  so  gigantic  a  task, 
to  divert  his  attention  and  that  of  his  audience  to  the 
gibbeting  of  the  frailties  of  a  series  of  small  poets  of 
his  time  is  not  probable,  and  is  nowhere  really  sug- 
gested by  the  text.1 

"Cynthia's  Revels"  has  a  narrower  scope  than 
"Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor"  in  as  much  as  it 
restricts  its  satire  practically  to  courtly  types  alone.  * 
Thus,  general  embodiments  of  fashionable  absurdity 
in  the  earlier  play,  like  Saviolina,  Fastidious,  and  Sir 
Puntarvolo,  become  the  progenitors  of  a  great  number 
of  more  subtly  differentiated  figures  in  the  later  work. 
In  these  narrow  subdivisions  of  the  genus  "courtier," 

1  The  only  serious  indication  of  personal  satire  in  Every  Man  out 
of  hia  Humor  is  found  in  the  circumstance  that  Clove,  a  minor  fig- 
ure in  III,  i,  employs  for  comic  effect  a  number  of  turgid  Marstonian 
words.  There  is  no  doubt  that  Jonson  had  Marston's  stylistic  excesses 
in  mind  when  he  wrote  the  passage;  but  the  theory  that  Clove  is  on 
that  account  to  be  regarded  as  a  personal  caricature  of  Marston  is 
quite  untenable.  The  very  same  passage  also  puts  into  Clove's  mouth 
a  parody  of  two  high-sounding  lines  of  Julius  Catar  (III,  ii,  1 10,  111); 
whence  we  should  have  to  assume  a  second  personal  identification 
between  Clove  and  Shakespeare. 


370  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

with  which  "  Cynthia's  Revels  "  mainly  concerns  itself, 
individual  traits  and  failings  naturally  play  a  some- 
what larger  part,  and  Jonson  doubtless  relies  rather 
more  than  in  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor"  upon 
his  observation  of  actual  persons.    It  may  be  barely 
possible,  for  instance,  that  he  gives  to  Hedon  and 
Anaides  unfavorable  peculiarities  which  he  had  noted 
among  his  fellow  poets.   But  he  is  far  likelier  to  have 
found  the  prototypes  of  these  figures  in  the  aristo- 
cratic circle  to  which  they  both  belong.   The  circum- 
stances of  composition  of  "Cynthia's  Revels"  seem 
in  themselves  to  negative  the  idea  that  the  play  is  in 
any  sense  the  outgrowth  of  a  literary  quarrel.  Jonson's 
purpose,  frankly  expressed,  is  the  Lylian  one  of  securing  v 
court  patronage  for  himself  by  means  of  a  Lylian  alle- 
gory in  eulogy  of  Elizabeth.    Such  a  drama,  written 
of  the  court  and  for  the  court,  and  with  the  object  of 
portraying  the  unapproachable  merits  of  the  author, 
would  surely  be  no  fit  place  for  expatiating  on  plebeian 
professional   squabbles   or   indulging    in   undignified 
bickerings  with  two  poets  admittedly  Jonson's  inferiors 
in  the  judgment  of  the  time.1 

1  I  am  not  forgetful  of  the  arguments  of  Fleay  and  Penniman  in 
favor  of  an  intricate  satirical  allegory  in  Cynthia's  Revels.  Even 
saner  critics  like  Small  accept  on  the  whole  the  identification  of 
Hedon  and  Anaides  with  Crispinus  and  Demetrius  in  The  Poetaster, 
and  hence  with  Marston  and  Dekker  respectively.  The  only  solid 
reason,  however,  for  this  is  the  fact  that  Dekker  makes  Horace 
(Jonson)  repeat  in  Satiromastix,  with  reference  to  Crispinus  and 
Demetrius,  words  which  Criticus  had  used  of  Hedon  and  Anaides  in 
Cynthia's  Revels :  — 

"  Why  should  I  care  what  euery  Dor  doth  buz 
In  credulous  ears  ?   It  is  a  crowne  to  me; 
That  the  best  iudgements  can  report  me  wrong'd. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    377 

I  believe,  therefore,  that  Jonson  did  not  openly 
express  himself  against  his  dramatic  rivals  before  the 
appearance  of  "The  Poetaster."  Yet  in  another  way 
he  had  undoubtedly  caused  irritation  general  enough 
to  justify  Dekker's  plea  of  self-defence  on  the  poetas- 
ters' side.  In  each  of  the  trio  of  satirical  comedies 
which  begins  with  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor," 
Jonson  presents  himself,  in  the  persons  of  Asper,  Criti- 
cus  (Crites),1  and  Horace  respectively,  as  an  insuffer- 

I  think  but  what  they  are,  and  am  not  moou'd: 
The  one  a  light  voluptuous  Reueler, 
The  other,  a  strange  arrogating  puffe, 
Both  impudent,  and  arrogant  enough." 

(Saliromastix,  ed.  Scherer,  11.  416-418,  420-423. 
Cf.  Cynthia's  Revels,  1602  version,  ed.  Bang, 

11.  1360-1362,  1376-1379.) 

From  the  comment  of  Asinius  0-  -*24),  "S'lid,  do  not  Criticus 
Reuel  in  these  lynes  ?  "  it  seems  clear  that  Dekker's  purpose  in  quot- 
ing the  passage  is  merely  to  ridicule  the  pompous  egoism  of  Criti- 
cus-Horace-Jonson,  and  not  at  all  to  suggest  the  identity  of  the 
two  pairs  of  characters  about  whom  the  words  are  spoken.  In  fact, 
Iledon  and  Anaides  do  not  resemble  Marston  and  Dekker  either  as 
the  latter  actually  were,  or  as  Jonson  caricatured  them  in  The 
Poetaster.  The  former  are  extravagant  and  feeble-minded  gallants 
of  the  court,  whose  offence  against  Criticus  consists  not  in  literary 
rivalry,  but  in  the  spreading  of  calumnious  reports.  Only  prepos- 
session in  favor  of  a  theory  could  well  suggest  a  connection  between 
these  symbolic  representatives  of  fashionable  dissipation  (Hedon  = 
Self-indulgence;  Anaides  =  Shamelessness)  and  the  beggarly  hacks, 
Crispinus  and  Demetrius,  of  The  Poetaster.  That  Dekker  himself 
did  not  expect  the  identification  to  be  pressed  is  obvious  from  the 
contradiction  between  the  quoted  description  of  Anaides,  "a  strange 
arrogating  puffe,"  and  Horace's  sketch  of  Demetrius  only  eight 
lines  above  as  "the  slightest  cob-web-la wne  peece  of  a  Poet"  (Satiro- 
mastix,  1.  415). 

1  The  representative  of  Jonson  in  Cynthia's  Revels  is  called  Criti- 


378  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

able  pattern  of  perfection.  Though  he  seems  in  the 
two  earlier  plays  of  the  group  to  be  hunting  larger 
game  than  Marston  and  Dekker,  and  to  be  contrast- 
ing his  virtues  with  the  defects  of  a  much  broader  world 
than  that  of  the  current  stage;  yet  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  his  general  arrogance  had  made  him  from 
the  first  a  butt  for  the  resentful  sarcasm  of  several 
writers  to  whom  Jonson  could  honestly  claim  to  have 
given  little  direct  offence.1 

Jonson's  excuse  for  "The  Poetaster"  was  that  he 
had  been  provoked  on  every  stage  for  three  years;  i.  e., 
from  about  1598.  It  is  regularly  accepted  that  the 
original  provocation  came  from  John  Marston,  and 
it  is  usual  to  explain  as  referring  to  this  circumstance 
Jonson's  later  statement  to  Drummond  of  Hawthorn- 
den  that  he  had  beaten  Marston  and  taken  his  pistol 
from  him,  because  the  latter  had  represented  him  on 
the  stage. 

In  the  search  for  a  work  which  might  thus  have 
incensed  Jonson,  two  plays  of  doubtful  Marstonian  > 
authorship  have  been  found.  "Histriomastix,"  a 
dull  allegorical  drama,  which  Marston  probably  re- 
vised about  1598,  certainly  involves  a  satire,  as  yet 
insufficiently  explained,  in  connection  with  the  public 
stage  of  the  time.  This  play  is,  furthermore,  given  the 
ominous  distinction  of  special  mention  by  name  in  the 

cus  in  the  first  edition  of  the  play  (1602)  and  in  the  allusions  of 
Satiromastix.  In  the  Jonson  Folio  of  1616,  and  consequently  in  most 
subsequent  editions,  the  name  is  altered  to  Crites. 

1  This  seems  to  be  the  fair  interpretation  of  the  dialogue  be- 
tween Horace,  Crispinus,  and  Demetrius  in  Satiromastix  (11.  436  ff), 
though  Dekker  naturally  overstresses  the  insincerity  and  malice  of 
Horace. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT     379 

sarcastic  passage  in  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor" 
most  frequently  quoted  in  relation  to  this  subject.1 
It  is  easy  to  make  out  a  resemblance  between  Jonson 
and  the  revised  (Marstonian  ?)  figure  of  Chrysoganus 
in  "Histriomastix";  but  Chrysoganus  is  presented  in 
what  seems  to  the  modern  reader  a  favorable  light. 
On  the  whole,  one  can  hardly  believe  that  Jonson  was 
greatly  angered  by  this  portrait.  It  may,  however, 
have  led  to  a  coolness  between  the  two  poets,  and  can 
quite  reasonably  have  served  Jonson  as  an  upper 
limit  when  he  came  later  to  make  a  mental  list  of  the 
stage  attacks  upon  himself. 

A  clearer  case  of  spite  on  Marston's  part  is  perhaps 
to  be  observed  in  "Jack  Drum's  Entertainment," 
printed  in  1601,  and  acted  by  the  Children  of  Paul's, 
who  later  performed  "Satiromastix."  In  the  absence 
of  definite  proof  of  Marston's  authorship  of  "Jack 
Drum,"  and  in  the  failure  of  all  unquestionable  allu- 
sions to  Jonson,  the  bearing  of  the  play  upon  the 
quarrel  is  likely  to  remain  matter  of  conjecture.  It  is 
certain,  however,  that  the  author  goes  out  of  his  way 
to  introduce  into  his  main  comedy  of  Pasquil  and 
Katherine  a  laughable  treatment  of  the  deserved 
humiliation  which  befalls  Brabant  Senior,  a  pompous 
egoist  of  Jonsonian  stamp.2  Though  the  matter  is 
hardly  susceptible  of  proof,  it  is  not  at  all  improbable 

1  See  the  speech  of  Clove  near  the  middle  of  III,  i  (Mermaid  ed., 
178). 

1  Fleay's  identification  of  Jonson  with  the  vicious  Frenchman, 
John  fo  de  King,  in  which  he  is  followed,  as  usual,  by  Penniman,  has 
nothing  to  recommend  it.  As  regards  the  only  situation  in  which 
any  parallel  has  been  suspected,  John  fo  de  King  is  represented  not 
in  a  satirical  light,  but  as  having  much  the  best  of  the  affair. 


380  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

that  this  comedy  precipitated  both  the  violent  cam- 
paign of  satire  which  filled  the  year  1601,  and  also  the 
personal  chastisement  with  which  Jonson  visited 
Marston. 

The  often  ill-advised  attempt  to  trace  the  workings 
of  personal  malice  in  this  quarrel  has  in  many  cases 
caused  too  little  attention  to  be  given  to  another 
aspect  of  the  controversy;  namely,  that  which  pre- 
sents it  as  the  outgrowth  of  corporate  jealousy  be- 
tween two  competing  theatres.  "The  Poetaster,"  as 
well  as  "Cynthia's  Revels"  and  "The  Case  Is  Al- 
tered," was  presented  by  the  Children  of  her  Majesty's 
Chapel,  to  whom  Jonson  had  transferred  his  services 
from  the  Lord  Chamberlain's  Company  after  the  pro- 
duction of  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor."  "Satiro- 
mastix"  was  acted  by  the  Chamberlain's  Company 
(Shakespeare's)  and  also  by  the  Children  of  Paul's, 
who  seem  at  this  period  to  have  had  some  affiliation 
with  the  Chamberlain's  Men.  "Jack  Drum's  Enter- 
tainment" and  probably  "  Histriomastix "  were  also 
performed  by  the  Children  of  Paul's,  like  Marston's 
authentic  early  play  of  "Antonio  and  Mellida." 

Both  "Satiromastix"  and  "The  Poetaster"  contain 
sarcastic  allusions  to  the  rival  place  of  entertainment. 
The  former  play  gibes  twice  at  the  Chapel  Children's 
locale,  the  Blackfriars  Theatre;  and  "The  Poetaster," 
performed  in  the  latter  place,  reciprocates  by  satirizing 
Histrio's  theatre  (The  Globe)  on  the  other  side  of 
"Tyber"  (i.  e.,  on  the  Bankside,  opposite  the  city), 
where,  instead  of  "Humors,  Revels,  and  Satires," 
Tucca  will  find  in  the  plays  as  much  ribaldry  as  he  can 
desire,  and  where,  Histrio  assures  him,  "all  the  sinners 
i'  the  suburbs  come  and  applaud  our  action  daily." 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    381 

We  do  not  know  the  cause  of  Jonson's  alienation 
from  the  Chamberlain's  Company  about  the  begin- 
ning of  1GOO;  but  the  change  seems  to  have  been 
accompanied  with  ill-feeling.  It  is  noticeable  that  the 
direct  attack  upon  Jonson  began,  according  to  all 
indications,  at  just  this  period;  and  it  is  certain  that 
"The  Poetaster"  does  not  merely  ridicule  in  Deme- 
trius (Dekker)  and  Crispinus  (Marston)  single  writers 
in  the  employ  of  the  possibly  allied  companies  of  the 
Globe  and  Paul's.  In  Histrio  and  in  a  number  of  ran- 
dom allusions  the  play  attacks  the  Chamberlain's  ^ 
Company  as  a  whole. 

The  fact  of  definite  hostility  between  the  Globe 
Company  and  that  of  the  Chapel  Children  is  further 
proved  by  the  famous  allusions  in  the  second  act  of 
"Hamlet."1  Rosencrantz's  description  of  the  "aery 
of  children"  certainly  refers  to  the  Children  of  the 
Chapel,  and  forms  a  natural  retort  to  Jonson's  ridicule 
of  the  Chamberlain's  Company  in  "The  Poetaster." 
According  to  Rosencrantz,  these  children,  given,  as 
Tucca  expresses  it,  to  "nothing  but  Humors,  Revels, 
and  Satires,  that  gird  and  fart  at  the  time,"  are  "little 
eyases,  that  cry  out  on  the  top  of  question  [deal  with 
matters  of  the  most  absolutely  contemporary  inter- 
est?] and  are  most  tyrannically  clapped  for  't:  these 
are  now  the  fashion,  and  so  berattle  the  common 
stages  [so  berate  the  adult  companies  ?]  that  many 
wearing  rapiers  are  afraid  of  goose-quills  [Jonsonian 
ridicule],  and  dare  scarce  come  thither." 

There  is  no  question,  then,  that  sharp  rivalry  ex- 
isted in  1601  between  the  professional  actors  of  the 
Globe  and  Fortune  (Henslowc's  theatre)  and  the  boy 

1  Scene  *.  11.  330  ff. 


382  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

players  of  the  Blackfriars  private  theatre,  who  acted 
under  the  special  patronage  of  the  queen,  and  who,  as 
all  the  allusions  show,  were  certainly  attracting  to 
their  expensive  performances  a  specially  large  pro- 
portion of  the  fashionable  public.  I  do  not  believe, 
however,  that  sufficient  evidence  exists  for  Professor 
Wallace's  assumption  that  the  popularity  of  Black- 
friars  was  seriously  endangering  the  prosperity  of  the 
Globe.1  Commercially  speaking,  plays  like  "Cynthia's 
Revels"  and  "The  Poetaster"  can  hardly  have  been 
very  formidable  rivals  to  such  notable  successes  as 
"Henry  V,"  "Julius  Caesar,"  and  "Hamlet,"  even 
when  we  make  the  greatest  possible  allowance  for  the 
current  topical  interest  of  the  former.  The  Black- 
friars  Theatre  also  was  relatively  small,  and  appears 
to  have  been  open  only  one  night  in  the  week.2^/ 
Shakespeare's  allusions  to  the  success  of  the  children, 
furthermore,  to  their  carrying  away  "Hercules  and  his 
load  too,"  as  well  as  to  the  "throwing  about  of  brains" 
in  the  theatrical  war  and  the  nation's  desire  that  the 
poet  and  the  player  should  go  "to  cuffs  in  the  ques- 
tion," are  far  from  showing  any  sense  of  personal  de- 
feat or  bitterness.  On  the  contrary,  these  allusions  are 
the  good-natured  tribute  of  the  assured  master  to 
amateur  cleverness.  Appearing  in  a  play  acted  a  few 
months  probably  after  "Satiromastix,"  they  indicate 
how  serene  Shakespeare  had  been  left  by  the  the- 
atrical dispute  and  all  the  personalities  involved  in  it. 
Both  in  the  first  quarto  (1603)  and  in  the  final 

1  Cf.  C.  W.  Wallace,  The  Children  of  the  Chapel  at  Blackfriars, 
1597-1603,  chapters  xiii  and  xiv. 

2  See  the  account  in  the  Duke  of  Stettin's  diary  (September, 
1602),  quoted  by  Wallace,  op.  cit.,  p.  106. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    383 

(Folio)  version  of  "Hamlet,"  the  company  of  adult 
players  is  represented  as  travelling  to  Elsinore  bo- 
cause  the  fantastic  humors  of  the  children  have  cap- 
tured the  metropolis.  This  circumstance,  indispen- 
sable to  the  plot  of  the  drama,  has,  of  course,  in  itself 
no  necessary  topical  significance  whatever.  Yet  it 
seems  likely  on  other  grounds  that  an  actual  tour  of 
Shakespeare's  company  toward  the  end  of  1601  is 
alluded  to;  and  the  fact  of  this  journey  makes  it 
possible,  I  think,  to  bring  the  play  of  "Hamlet"  into 
connection  with  the  only  piece  of  real  evidence  con- 
cerning the  "War  of  the  Theatres"  hitherto  unmen- 
tioned. 

It  is  probable  that  "The  Poetaster,"  "Satiromas- 
tix,"  and  "Hamlet"  were  all  first  produced  in  1601, 
and  in  the  order  named.1  Still  later  doubtless  in  the 
same  year,  during  the  Christmas  season,  the  students 
of  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge,  performed  the  sec- 
ond part  of  "The  Return  from  Parnassus,"  the  last 
member  of  a  curious  trilogy,  partly  realistic  and  partly 
allegorical  in  nature.  In  Act  IV,  scene  3,  occurs  one 
of  the  most  important  of  all  the  contemporary  allu- 

1  It  must  be  confessed  that  the  precise  date  of  Hamlet,  whether 
1601  or  1602,  is  still  somewhat  doubtful.  However,  the  entry  of  the 
play  on  the  Stationers'  Register,  July  26,  1602,  "as  yt  was  latelie 
Acted  by  the  Lord  Chamberleyne  his  servantes"  suggests  that  the 
6rst  London  run  of  the  play  was  then  over.  Printers  who  could 
publish  an  edition  of  a  play  still  current  on  the  boards  seldom  failed 
to  advertise  that  fact.  Cf.  title-page  to  Wilkins's  Miseries  of  Enforced 
Marriage  (1607),  "As  it  is  now  playd  by  his  Maiesties  Seruants." 
I  believe  that  the  first  acting  of  Hamlet  can  safely  be  pushed  back 
to  the  autumn  of  1601.  It  should  be  noted  that  the  allusion  to 
Christmas  (I,  i,  158-165),  sometimes  taken  as  dating  the  play,  has  in 
both  the  quartos  very  much  the  appearance  of  a  later  interpolation. 


384  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

sions  to  Shakespeare.  The  words  are  placed  in  the 
mouth  of  the  famous  actor,  William  Kemp:  "Why 
here 's  our  fellow  Shakespeare  puts  them  all  down  — 
ay,  and  Ben  Jonson  too.  O  that  Ben  Jonson  is  a  pesti- 
lent fellow;  he  brought  up  Horace,  giving  the  poets  a 
pill;  but  our  fellow  Shakespeare  hath  given  him  a  purge 
that  made  him  bewray  his  credit." 

This  is  the  last  significant  reference  to  the  War  of  the 
Theatres,  and  it  has  been  variously  explained.  "Troi- 
lus  and  Cressida,"  as  an  obscure  satirical  comedy  of 
the  same  approximate  period,  has  been  most  fre- 
quently selected  for  the  "purge"  with  which  Shake- 
speare answered  Jonson's  "Poetaster."  Upon  sober 
consideration,  however,  it  is  hardly  possible  to  find, 
either  in  the  figure  of  Ajax  or  elsewhere  in  the  play, 
any  reliable  indication  of  anti  -  Jonsonian  purpose. 
Still  less  likely,  I  think,  are  the  other  alternatives:  that 
Shakespeare  wrote  a  lost  play  against  Jonson;  and  that 
the  author  of  the  "Return  from  Parnassus,"  who 
shows  a  very  glib  knowledge  of  contemporary  litera- 
ture, ascribed  to  Shakespeare  the  "  Satiromastix "  of 
Dekker. 

I  do  not  know  that  the  reference  to  the  purge  in  this 
Cambridge  play  has  been  definitely  associated  hitherto 
with  the  fact  that  "Hamlet"  was  acted,  as  the  title- 
page  of  the  first  quarto  (1603)  tells  us,  not  only  in 
London,  but  "also  in  the  two  Universities  of  Cam- 
bridge and  Oxford,  and  elsewhere."  l  This  announce- 

1  Professor  E.  B.  Reed  ("The  College  Element  in  Hamlet,"  Mod. 
Phil.,  vi,  1909)  connects  the  two  plays,  assigning  the  priority  to  the 
Cambridge  piece.  Professor  Boas  (Cambridge  History,  VI,  ch.  xii) 
partially  accepting  Reed's  theory,  suggests  Christmas,  1602  (N.  S.), 
rather  than  1(501  as  the  date  of  the  second  part  of  The  Return  from 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    885 

ment,  together,  with  the  mention  in  the  text  itself 
of  the  travelling  of  the  players,  seems  to  point  to  a 
tour  of  the  Globe  Company  before  the  end  of  1601. 
Now  the  allusion  to  the  "Purge"  in  the  "Return  from 
Parnassus"  is  of  such  a  nature  as  to  make  it  almost 
certain  that  the  audience  fully  understood  the  refer- 
ence. I  believe  that  the  passage  was  intended  to  recall 
some  clearly  expressed  rebuke  of  Jonson  in  the  text 
of  "Hamlet"  as  recently  acted  in  Cambridge.   To  be 
sure,  as  the  latter  play  is  preserved,  it  contains  no  dis- 
tinct anti-Jonsonian  stroke;  but  that  fact  is  easily 
explained.   It  should  be  remembered  that  the  earliest 
(1603)  version  of  "Hamlet"  contains  only  an  exces- 
sively  abbreviated   mention  of   the   theatrical  war; 
while  the  later  quartos  of  1604,  etc.,  though  certainly 
based  on  the  true  complete  copy,  purposely  omit  the 
twenty  most  significant  lines  concerning  the  "little 
eyases."   The  reason  for  the  non-appearance  of  these 
lines  in  all  editions  except  the  1623  Folio,  is  obviously 
the  same  as  that  which  prevented  Jonson  from  pub- 
lishing his  Apologetical  Dialogue  to  "The  Poetaster" 
in  the  1602  edition  of  that  play;  namely,  the  "Re- 
straint by  Authority  "  of  which  Jonson  expressly  com- 
plains. 

When  the  collective  editions  of  Jonson  and  Shake- 
speare were  issued,  in  1616  and  1623  respectively,  there 
was  no  longer  any  necessity  of  suppressing  general 
allusions  to  the  long-past  quarrel  of  the  theatres.  But 
there  did  exist  the  strongest  reason  why  Shakespeare's 
editors  should  not  have  cared  to  give  wanton  offence 
to  the  most  influential  poet  of  the  day,  the  generous 

Parnassus.    On  this  last  assumption  the  earlier  date  of  Hamlet 
would  be  certain. 


386  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

supporter  of  their  enterprise,  by  restoring  excised  and 
forgotten  bits  of  personal  ridicule.  I  believe,  there- 
fore, that  the  purge  which  made  Jonson  bewray  his 
credit,  the  blow  with  which  Shakespeare  closed  the 
War  of  the  Theatres,  was  to  be  found  in  "Hamlet" 
as  that  play  was  presented  in  Cambridge,  London,  and 
elsewhere,  in  1601-1602.  I  believe  that  it  lay  in  the 
power  of  Shakespeare's  literary  executors,  Heming  and 
Condell,  to  preserve  this  passage,  as  they  preserved  the 
general  quizzing  of  the  little  eyases,  in  their  authori- 
tative edition  of  the  play.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  how- 
ever, that  in  leaving  to  oblivion  such  a  piece  of  transi- 
tory satire,  which,  even  though  not  very  unfriendly, 
may  have  been  very  humiliating  to  Jonson,  the  editors 
would  have  been  faithfully  observing  the  wish  of  the 
dead  poet  and  the  obvious  proprieties  of  the  situation. 
In  view  of  the  magnificent  eulogy  which  Jonson  was 
even  at  the  moment  contributing  to  their  edition,  the 
raking  up  of  animosities  of  twenty  years'  standing 
would  have  been  nothing  short  of  unpardonable. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 
GENERAL   CRITICISM 

A.  THE  MARPRELATE  CONTROVERSY 

Arber,  Edward  :  "Introductory  Sketch  to  the  Martin  Marpre- 
late  Controversy,"  1880,  1895. 

Maskell,  William  :  A  History  of  the  Martin  Marprelate  Con- 
troversy in  the  Reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  1845. 

McKerrow,  R.  B.  :  "  The  Martin  Marprelate  Controversy," 
Nashe's  Works,  vol.  v,  pp.  34  ff. 

Thompson,  E.  N.  S. :  "  The  Controversy  between  the  Puritans 
and  the  Stage,"  Yale  Studies,  xx,  1903. 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    387 

Pierce,  W.  :  Historical  Introduction  to  the  Marprelate  Tracts, 

1909. 
"Wilson,  J.  D.  :  "  The  Marprelate  Controversy,"   Cambridge 

History  of  English  Literature,  vol.  ill,  cb.  xvii,  pp.  425-452. 

B.  THE  WAB  OF  THE  THEATRES 

Penniman,  J.  H.  :  The  War  of  the  Theatres,  1897. 

Small,  R.  A. :  The  Stage-Quarrel  betioeen  Ben  Jonson  and  the 
to-called  Poetasters,  1899. 

Wallace,  C.  W. :  The  Children  of  the  Chapel  at  Blackfriars, 
1597-1603.  1908.  Chapters  ilii  and  xiv.  [See  also  H.  C.  Hart, 
"  Harvey,  Marston,  and  Ben  Jonson,"  Notes  and  Queries,  Se- 
ries ix,  vol.  xi,  pp.  201,  281,  343,  501.  Continued  in  vol.  xii, 
pp.  161,  263,  342,  403,  482  (1903).] 

TEXT   AND    COMMENTARY 
I.  PLATS  REPRESENTING  CONTEMPORARY  MUBDEBS 

Arden  of  Feversham,  1592.  Reprinted  1599, 1633.  For  list  of 
later  editions  and  commentary,  see  The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 
The  play  has  recently  been  reprinted  in  "  Everyman's  Library  " 
(Pre-Shakespearean  Tragedies). 

A  Warning  for  Fair  Women.  "  Acted  by  the  right  Honor- 
able, the  Lord  Chamberlaiue  his  Seruantes,"  1599.  Reprinted 
R.  Simpson,  The  School  of  Shakspere,  vol.  ii,  1878. 

YABINGTON,  ROBERT  :  Two  Lamentable  Tragedies.  "The 
one,  of  the  murther  of  Maister  Beech  a  Chaundler  in  Tliames- 
streete,  and  his  boye,  done  by  Thomas  Merry,"  1601.  Re- 
printed, A.  H.  Bullen,  Old  Plays,  iv,  1885.  Discussion :  R.  A. 
Law,  "  Yarington's  '  Two  Lamentable  Tragedies,' "  Modern 
Language  Review,  v  (1910),  167-177. 

A  Yorkshire  Tragedy.  "  Acted  by  his  Maiesties  Players  at 
the  Globe.  Written  by  W.  Shakspeare,"  1608.  Reprinted 
1619,  and  in  the  third  and  fourth  Shakespeare  Folios  (1664, 
1685).  For  later  editions  and  commentary,  see  The  Shake- 
speare Apocrypha. 

II.  PLATS  INDIRECTLT  INFLUENCED  BT  CONTEMPORART  MURDERS 

WILKINS,  GEORGE  :  The  Miseries  of  Enforced  Marriage. 
"  As  it  is  now  playd  by  his  Maiesties  Seruants,  1607.  Other 


388  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

editions,  1611,  1629, 1637.    Reprinted,  Dodsley,  all  editions  ; 
Ancient  British  Drama,  vol.  ii,  1810. 

HEYWOOD,  THOMAS  :  A  "Woman  Killed  with  Kindness, 
1607.  Another  edition,  1617.  Reprinted,  Reed's  and  Collier's 
Dodsley  •  Ancient  British  Drama,  ii,  1810 ;  Hey  wood's  Works, 
Mermaid  edition,  etc. 

III.  PLATS  RELATING  TO  THE  WAR  OP  THE  THEATRES 

DEKKER,  THOMAS  :  Satiromastix.  "  Or  The  vntrussing  of  the 
Humorous  Poet.  As  it  hath  bin  presented  publikely,  by  the 
Right  Honorable,  the  Lord  Chamberlaine  his  Seruants  ;  and 
priuately,  by  the  Children  of  Paules,"  1602.  Reprinted:  T. 
Hawkins,  Origin  of  the  English  Drama,  vol.  iii,  1773  ;  Works 
of  Dekker,  ed.  Pearson,  1873 ;  H.  Scherer,  Materialien,  xx, 
1907.  Edition  by  J.  H.  Penniman  announced  in  Belles  Lettres 
series  (with  Poetaster"). 

JONSON,  BEN  :  Poetaster.  "  Or  The  Arraignment :  As  it  hath 
beene  sundry  times  priuately  acted  in  the  Blacke  Friers,  by 
the  children  of  her  Maiesties  Chappell,"  1602.  Reprinted  in 
1616  and  later  editions  of  Jonson's  works.  (For  bibliography 
to  The  Case  is  Altered,  Every  Man  Out  of  his  Humor, 
and  Cynthia's  Revels,  which  have  only  an  indirect  connec- 
tion with  the  controversy,  see  p.  416  ff.) 

MARSTON,  JOHN  ?  :  Histriomastix.  "  Or,  the  Player  whipt," 
1610.    Reprinted,  R.  Simpson,   School  of  Shakspere,  vol.  ii, 
1878.  (Marston's  conjectural  share  in  this  play  cannot  extend 
beyond  the  mere  revision  of  a  work  by  another  hand.) 
Jack  Drum's  Entertainment.  "  Or  The  Comedie  Of  Pasquill 
and  Katherine.  As  it  hath  bene  sundry  times  plaide  by  the 
Children  of  Powles,"  1601.  (Marston's  authorship  doubtful.) 
Reprinted,  R.  Simpson,  School  of  Shakspere,  vol.  ii. 
What  You  Will,  1607.   (Connection  with   the   controversy 
vague.)  Reprinted  in  Marstou's  Works,  ed.  Halliwell,  1856  : 
ed.  A.  H.  Bullen,  1887. 

SHAKESPEARE,  WILLIAM  :  Troilus  and  Cressida,  1609  (two 

issues).  (Connection  with  the  controversy  doubtful.) 

Hamlet,  Prince  of  Denmark.  "  As  it  hath  beene  diuerse  times 

acted  by  his  Highnesse  seruants  in  the  Cittie  of  London  :  as 

also  in  the  two  Vniuersities  of  Cambridge  and  Oxford,  and 

else-where,"  1603.  (Abbreviated  and  corrupted  version.)  An- 


DRAMA  OF  CONTEMPORARY  INCIDENT    389 

other  edition,  "  Newly  imprinted  and  enlarged  to  almost  as 
much  againe  as  it  was,  according  to  the  true  and  perfect 
Coppie,"  1604.  Reprinted  1605,  1611,  1637,  etc. 
The  Return  from  Parnassus.  "  Or  The  Scourge  of  Simony. 
Publiquely  acted  by  the  Students  in  Saint  Johns  Colledge  in 
Cambridge,"  1606.  For  further  bibliography,  see  next  chapter, 
p.  420. 


CHAPTER  XI 

REALISTIC   COMEDT 

THE  last  chapter  in  the  history  of  the  true  Eliza- 
bethan drama  is  that  which  describes  the  acceptance 
into  the  highest  theatrical  favor  of  plays  occupied 
primarily  with  the  treatment  of  contemporary  man- 
ners and  vices.  The  sudden  overwhelming  popularity 
after  1600  of  that  comedy  of  class  types  and  distinc- 
tively local  application,  which  Ben  Jonson's  "Every 
Man  in  his  Humor"  (1598)  perhaps  inaugurated,  is 
eloquent  of  changed  conditions  both  on  the  stage  and 
in  the  life  of  London.  It  indicates,  on  the  one  hand, 
the  disappearance  of  the  catholic  largeness  of  view 
which  generally  universalizes  and  idealizes  Eliza- 
bethan plays;  and  it  bears  witness  to  the  breaking  up 
of  the  national  unity  of  the  earlier  simpler  age  into  the 
strongly  marked  social  and  factional  groups  of  Stuart 
England. 

Properly  considered,  the  stage  of  Elizabeth's  reign 
was  far  more  realistic  —  more  adequately  expressive 
of  national  life  and  character  —  than  any  which  suc- 
ceeded it;  but,  like  all  agents  of  legitimate  realism,  it 
reflected  rather  the  fundamental  moral  and  intellectual 
content  than  the  material  superficialities  of  the  epoch. 
The  growing  consciousness  of  personal  peculiarities 
of  manner,  and  the  tendency  of  the  drama  to  devote 
its  highest  talent  and  most  careful  art  to  the  treatment 
of  the  commonplaces  of  everyday  existence  were  neces- 
sarily consequent  upon  a  diminution  in  the  earlier  emo- 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  391 

tional  and  imaginative  ardor.   It  is  in  literature  as  in 
life :  minute  interest  in  external  details  and  in  whimsi-  ' 
calities  of  speech  or  fashion  seldom  coexists  with  the 
intensest  moral  zeal  or  mental  aspiration. 

Not  only  is  seventeenth-century  drama  less  exalted 
in  tone  than  that  which  we  may  properly  call  Eliza- 
bethan; it  is  also  far  less  universal  in  its  scope.  One 
of  the  most  potent  literary  influences  in  the  age  of 
Elizabeth  was  the  essential  unity  of  taste,  produced 
by  the  sudden  development  of  national  feeling  which, 
in  spite  of  the  superficial  lines  of  cleavage,  made  prince 
and  peasant  really  one  in  sentiment,  character,  and 
manner,  and  gave  to  the  society  of  the  time  much  of 
the  naivete  and  simple  directness  of  primitive  com- 
munities. This  feature  of  the  age  is  everywhere  re- 
flected in  the  drama.  The  academic  imitations  of 
foreign  aristocratic  species  never  achieved  real  suc- 
cess, even  with  the  higher  classes,  till  they  had  been 
so  modified  as  to  appeal  to  the  tastes  of  the  general 
public.1  During  the  heyday  of  English  drama,  the 
twenty  years  following  1590,  plays  were  incessantly 
being  transported  from  the  popular  stage  to  the  royal 
court,  and  back  again;  and  those  which  most  gained 
the  applause  of  the  rabble  in  the  pit  were  nearly  al- 
ways the  favorites  also  of  the  learned  and  noble  con- 
noisseurs. 

Social  distinctions  were  felt  by  the  Elizabethans  as 
political  barriers,  indispensable  to  good  government 
and  therefore  rigidly  to  be  maintained;  but  there  is  no 

1  The  sole  exception  to  this  statement  is  to  be  found  in  the  earlier 
comedies  of  Lyly;  and  these  plays  owed  their  hold  upon  fashionable 
audiences  less  to  purely  dramatic  features  than  to  their  connection 
with  courtly  gossip. 


392  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

evidence  that  the  age  connected  differences  of  char- 
acter in  any  clear  way  with  differences  of  station  or 
employment.  The  social  democracy  of  the  time  is 
constantly  exemplified,  to  a  degree  often  perplexing 
to  the  modern  reader,  in  the  dramas  of  Shakespeare 
and  his  contemporaries:  in  the  motley  society  of  the 
Henry  IV  plays  and  "The  Merchant  of  Venice";  in  the 
frank  independence  of  the  gardener  in  "Richard  II," 
the  grave-digger  in  "  Hamlet,"  the  sergeant  in  "  Mac- 
beth"; and  in  the  freedom  everywhere  accorded  to  the 
clown.  The  nobleman,  the  shepherd,  and  the  merchant 
might  meet  on  terms  of  at  least  temporary  equality, 
not  only  on  the  stage,  but  in  actual  life  as  well;  and  the 
extreme  haziness  of  the  lines  which  mark  the  various 
gradations  in  dignity  between  the  Dean  of  St.  Paul's, 
Sir  Thomas  Gresham  the  merchant  prince,  Hobson 
the  haberdasher,  and  John  Goodfellow  the  pedlar  in 
Heywood's  play  1  is  no  very  inaccurate  picture  of  ex- 
isting conditions.  For  the  Elizabethans,  consequently, 
tragic  and  comic  effect  were  both  absolute.  They 
resulted  from  the  character  of  the  individual,  and  had 
nothing  to  do  with  the  rank  to  which  he  belonged  or 
the  measure  in  which  he  followed  the  rules  of  estab- 
lished fashion.  Even  the  most  topical  dramas  of  this 
period  are  in  no  sense  limited  to  a  special  class.  The 
authors  of  the  murder  plays  found  equal  material  for 
tragedy  in  the  fate  of  the  humble  shop-keeper  Beech, 
the  city  merchant  Sanders,  and  the  country  gentle- 
men Arden  and  Calverley. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  how- 
ever, there  began  to  appear  a  change  in  the  structure 
of  society  which  became  a  characteristic  feature  of 
1  //  You  Know  Not  Me,  You  Know  Nobody,  Part  II. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  393 

Jacobean  life,  and  served  to  distinguish  the  entire 
Stuart  drama  from  that  of  the  Tudors.  About  1600, 
as  the  all-absorbing  excitement  of  the  Spanish  wars 
gave  place  to  the  general  conviction  of  national  secu- 
rity, and  the  flux  of  political  and  social  adjustment 
consequent  upon  the  Renaissance  came  to  a  stable 
equilibrium,  the  lines  between  the  different  ranks  of 
the  people  grew  hard  and  rigid;  and  the  world  of 
fashion  evolved  a  code  of  manners  complex  and  arti- 
ficial to  a  degree  previously  unknown.  The  opposition 
between  the  court  and  city  circles  and  between  town 
and  country  habits  was  sharply,  even  bitterly,  accen- 
tuated; and  the  stage,  which  had  interpreted  life  in 
terms  of  universal  significance,  became  the  mirror  of 
local  prejudice  and  the  scourge  of  social  folly.  Thus 
it  happened  that  the  Elizabethan  drama,  which  in  its 
power  of  expressing  general  communal  feeling  is  con- 
tinually reminiscent  of  the  great  national  tragedy  of 
Athens,  was  succeeded  by  a  type  of  comedy  suggestive 
rather  of  the  narrow  urban  life  portrayed  by  the 
Roman  dramatists.  It  is  therefore  no  accident  that;' 
the  first  years  of  the  seventeenth  century  witnessed  a 
sudden  burst  of  direct  Plautine  and  Terentian  imi-  < 
tation  more  striking  even  than  that  caused  by  the 
original  introduction  of  those  authors  to  English  play- 
wrights. The  stifling  atmosphere  of  over-ripe  civiliza- 
tion pictured  by  the  Latin  plagiarists  of  the  decadent 
Greek  comedians  —  in  which  wit  consists  in  the  por- 
trayal of  clever  knavery  and  the  ridicule  of  the  mala- 
droit and  unfashionable  —  was  largely  unintelligible 
to  Udall.  But  by  the  time  of  James's  accession,  Lon- 
don manners  had  become  far  more  intricate  and  self- 
conscious;  and  the  greatest  comic  artists  of  that  era, 


894  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Ben  Jonson,  Chapman,  and  Middleton,  often  follow 
close  in  the  path  of  Terence,  producing  thus  a  drama 
which  is  less  truly  a  continuation  of  the  Elizabethan 
method  than  a  foreshadowing  of  Restoration  tenden- 
cies. 

In  tragedy  also  the  change  in  the  times  made  itself 
felt:  for  example,  in  the  cult  of  unnatural  horror,  in 
the  removal  of  the  plot  from  the  realm  of  ordinary 
human  sympathy  and  acquaintance,  and  in  the  grow- 
ing inclination  to  represent  the  main  figures  as  con- 
ventional dignitaries  in  conventional  romantic  cities. 
But  in  tragedy,  the  practice  of  Shakespeare  main- 
tained the  old  standards  till  after  the  Jacobean  age 
was  well  inaugurated;  whereas,  in  comedy,  we  can 
detect  even  before  the  death  of  Elizabeth  the  begin- 
nings of  the  distinctively  Stuart  method. 

The  great  exponent  of  the  genuine  Elizabethan  atti- 
tude toward  realistic  comedy  is  Shakespeare,  who 
portrays  with  unsurpassed  truth  the  characters  and 
incidents  of  average  contemporary  life,  but  always 
for  the  purpose  of  relieving  and  interpreting  a  higher 
ideal  theme.  For  this  poet  and  for  the  age  whose  spirit 
he  voiced,  the  world  of  commonplace  actuality  was 
never  dissociated  from  the  world  of  lofty  achievement 
and  romantic  beauty.  Though,  like  his  princely  hero, 
he  does  not  fail  to  "remember  the  poor  creature,  small 
beer,"  l  life  and  humanity  are  for  him  invariably  pos- 
sessed of  a  nobler  meaning  than  can  be  discerned  by  the 
self-deluded  realist,  lago,  or  many  soullessly  objective 
authors  of  Jacobean  comedy.  Thus,  Shakespeare's 
plays  always  infer,  behind  the  material  phenomena  of 
existence,  —  the  suckling  of  fools  and  chronicling  of 
1  2  Henry  IV,  II,  ii,  10. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  395 

small  beer,  —  moral  and  imaginative  issues  which  de- 
termine the  dramatic  standards  of  value  and  inspire 
the  answer  to  every  problem  presented. 

In  Shakespeare's  earliest  independent  play,  "Love's 
Labor 's  Lost,"  he  draws  very  largely  upon  the  absurd- 
ities of  the  life  about  him,  mimicking  familiar  coun- 
try types  in  Costard,  Dull,  Holofernes,  and  Sir  Na- 
thaniel, while  in  Armado  and  the  various  lords  and 
ladies  he  ridicules  the  passing  whims  of  courtly  society. 
So  in  "Much  Ado  About  Nothing,"  the  comedy  which 
shows  most  kinship  with  "Love's  Labor 's  Lost,"  l  the 
plebeian  buffoonery  of  Dogberry  and  Verges  is  like- 
wise accompanied  by  the  attempt  to  imitate  in  the 
dialogue  of  Beatrice  and  Benedick  the  wit  and  badi- 
nage of  contemporary  high  life.  In  both  these  plays, 
however,  the  realism  is  a  matter  of  mood  and  charac- 
ter rather  than  of  microscopic  external  detail;  and  in 
both  it  is  subordinated  to  a  romantic  intrigue  plot. 

Shakespeare's  mature  treatment  carries  the  humors 
and  incidents  of  ordinary  life  even  farther  into  the 
sphere  of  universal  truth.  In  his  greatest  plays  the 
realistic  and  fanciful  elements  are  perfectly  blended 
and  mutually  complementary.  No  longer  products  of 
antipodal  regions  of  thought  or  opposite  points  of 
view,  they  become  in  his  philosophy  the  warp  and 
woof  from  whose  intertwining  threads  the  fabric  of 
true  life  must  in  every  age  be  woven.  Thus  he  cuts 
realistic  drama  adrift  from  the  limitations  of  space  and 
time,  and  uses  the  mass  of  observation  concerning  the 

1  There  appears  to  be  much  better  cause  than  it  is  now  usual  to 
allow  for  identifying  Much  Ado  in  an  earlier  form  with  the  Lore'g 
Labor  Won  of  Meres  and  regarding  it  as  a  twin  drama  to  Lore  a 
Labor  'a  Lost. 


396  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

superficialities  of  character  and  action,  which  he  had 
culled  in  London  and  Stratford,  to  picture  forth  as 
occasion  might  demand  either  the  Roman  mobs  of 
"Csesar"  and  "Coriolanus,"  the  rude  mechanicals  of 
Thesean  Athens,  the  merry  rogue  of  sea-girt  Bohemia, 
or  the  Trinculo  and  Stephano  of  his  enchanted  island. 
This  procedure  is  entirely  expressive  of  the  general 
Elizabethan  spirit  in  its  just  indifference  to  petty 
anachronism  and  its  great  power  of  conceiving  and 
vitalizing  distant  scenes.  Artistically,  also,  it  is  wise 
and  right.  The  high  romantic  passions  can  be  analyzed 
and  presented  in  many  media;  but  the  humbler, 
ephemeral  details,  which  make  up  so  much  of  life  and 
so  little  of  history,  can  ordinarily  be  realized  only  in 
one's  immediate  environment.  Shakespeare's  intro- 
duction  into  the  midst  of  plays  pitched  among  remote 
\  or  fanciful  surroundings  of  scenes  in  minor  key,  which 
reflect  the  monotone  of  existence  in  sixteenth-century 
England,  is  therefore  no  real  breach  of  unity  or  con- 
sistency. On  the  contrary,  it  shows  the  dramatist's 
recognition  of  the  great  principle  that  life,  at  all  times 
and  under  all  conditions,  is  a  coat  of  many  colors  never 
adequately  represented  by  the  few  bright  patches  of 
which  alone  romance  takes  cognizance.  And  those 
precise  readers  offended  by  the  sweaty  nightcaps  of 
the  Roman  rabble  or  the  English  ballad-mongering 
of  the  Bohemian  Autolycus  make  thoughtless  outcry 
against  casual  inconsistencies  inherent  in  the  full  deep 
grasp  of  society  as  a  whole  which  gives  to  the  plays 
in  question  the  truest  realism  in  their  eternal  faith- 
fulness to  human  nature. 

This  fundamental  belief  in  the  immutable  com- 
plexity of  life  makes  Shakespeare  insist,  on  the  one 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  897 

hand,  that  cobblers  and  weavers  must  have  had  their 
place  in  the  commonwealth  of  Caesar  or  of  Theseus, 
and  that  they  must  have  reasoned  and  acted  then 
much  as  in  his  own  time.  On  the  other  hand,  it  causes 
him  to  give  also  to  his  individual  comic  figures  a  deep 
humanity  which  renders  them  more  than  the  mere 
product  of  transitory  conditions.  Falstaff,  Sir  Toby 
Belch,  Malvolio,  Autolycus  and  the  rest  speak  the 
intellectual  language  and  exemplify  the  vices  and 
prejudices  of  that  particular  London  environment 
whose  contact  had  taught  Shakespeare  to  conceive 
them,  and  in  terms  of  which  alone  he  could  convinc- 
ingly depict  their  characters.  Yet,  like  their  creator, 
they  are  not  of  an  age,  but  for  all  time.  What  the  poet 
had  learned,  item  by  item,  from  personal  experience 
of  the  world  through  which  he  walked,  concerning  the 
less  acute  issues  of  life,  he  gives  forth  in  his  humorous 
figures  so  digested  and  explained  that  it  finds  equal 
currency  in  bygone  Britain  and  in  visionary  Illyria. 
And  the  reason  for  this  is  Shakespeare's  abiding  faith 
that  in  any  society  worth  portraying,  anywhere  ex- 
istent, the  eccentric  force  of  heroic  and  romantic  aspi- 
ration must  inevitably  be  held  in  balance  by  the  sane 
power  of  that  humorous  or  "realistic"  tendency, 
which  sees  things  as  they  are  and  does  not  look  beyond 
actual  conditions.  For  Shakespeare,  therefore,  realism 
is  no  mere  by-product  of  his  own  generation,  self-con- 
cerned and  self-destructive,  but  an  everlasting  con- 
servative force  which  keeps  the  world  sweet  and  habit- 
able. Falstaff  and  Mercutio  are  expressions  of  the  vis 
inertias  of  civilization,  which  maintains  the  equili- 
brium of  society  against  its  revolutionary  Hotspurs 
and  Romeos.  Thus  Falstaff  finds  his  logical  unques- 


398  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tionable  place  in  the  world,  whether  we  choose  to 
think  of  him  as  Oldcastle,  the  companion  of  Henry  V's 
youth,  or  as  Fastolfe,  the  cowardly  knight  of  Talbot's 
wars  a  generation  later,  or,  disregarding  history  alto- 
gether, simply  as  the  fat  boon  companion  of  Shake- 
speare's own  day.  In  all  that  really  matters  his  figure 
possesses  as  much  truth  in  the  earliest  of  these  environ- 
ments as  in  the  latest;  and  the  critic  has  little  more 
reason  to  object  to  the  employment  of  the  street  and 
tavern  sights  of  1600  for  the  purpose  of  realizing  the 
character  of  a  fifteenth-century  epicure,  than  he  would 
have  for  forbidding  Caesar,  Hector,  and  Hamlet  to 
speak  English. 

Thus,  the  trend  of  Shakespeare's  dramatic  practice 
set  increasingly,  as  his  genius  developed,  toward  the 
utilization  of  what  was  accidental  and  ephemeral  in 
the  world  around  him  for  the  demonstration  of  uni- 
versal truth.  More  and  more  clearly  he  seems  to  have 
perceived  that  realism  is  as  little  as  romance  itself  the 
necessary  adjunct  of  a  particular  time  and  place;  and 
his  greatest  realistic  play,  "King  Lear,"  is  a  tragedy 
located,  perhaps  intentionally,  at  the  farthest  distance 
from  the  contemporary  world.  "  Lear  "  is  throughout  a 
delineation,  not  of  history  or  of  heroic  tragedy,  but  of 
the  more  domestic  aspects  in  the  relation  of  man  to 
man,  which  each  writer  can  understand  only  from 
sympathetic  observation  of  the  life  before  his  window 
and  which  few  have  ever  been  able  to  reproduce  save 
by  means  of  the  closest  transcription.  In  Shakespeare's 
treatment,  King  Lear  and  his  daughters  lose  the  vague 
royal  dignity  which  the  earlier  anonymous  play  on 
the  same  subject  allows  them,  and  become  practically 
bourgeois  types;  while  the  kingdom  of  Britain  could 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  399 

be  replaced  without  dramatic  loss  by  a  farm.  "Mac- 
beth" and  "Othello,"  typical  expressions  of  heroic 
tragedy,  deal  with  the  fate  of  supernormal  figures, 
nature's  aristocrats,  overwhelmed  by  the  most  tre- 
mendous catastrophes:  but  "King  Lear"  is  a  parable 
of  common  life  possible  only  for  one  whose  eyes  had 
been  long  fixed  on  the  low  average  of  human  society, 
and  designed  to  portray  the  hideous  consequences 
attendant  upon  the  ignoble  faults  of  vulgar  self-will 
and  petty  ingratitude.  Lear,  Goneril,  Regan,  and 
Cordelia  are  all  fundamentally  creatures  of  the  hard 
actual  world;  and  their  egotisms  and  bickering  belong 
to  the  same  type  and  have  obviously  the  same  source 
in  contemporary  observation  as  dozens  of  the  cynical 
or  satirical  scenes  in  the  city  comedies  of  Jonson  and 
Chapman.  The  unlovely  aspects  of  human  society 
when  centred  hi  self  and  unenlightened  by  the  spark 
of  romantic  endeavor,  furnished  the  ordinary  seven- 
teenth-century playwright  with  matter  for  merriment, 
or  at  best  for  satire;  but  Shakespeare  has  here  shaped 
it  into  tragedy  too  deep  for  tears. 

The  realism  of  "King  Lear"  is  the  proper  pendant 
to  the  idealism  of  "The  Tempest."  Both  plays  show 
the  poet's  sharp  experience  of  the  corroding  mean- 
nesses of  life  and  both  testify  to  his  triumph  over  their 
discouraging  influence.  The  author's  transference  of 
his  story,  in  "Lear,"  to  the  broad  stage  of  myth  and 
fiction  enables  him  to  give  universal  application  to  his 
picture  of  the  unloveliness  of  that  dwarfed  and  dis- 
torted human  nature  in  which  the  theatre  of  his  time 
was  coming  more  and  more  to  find  material  for  careless 
laughter.  The  same  transfer  allows  him  scope  for 
showing,  as  no  writer  has  ever  shown,  before  or  since, 


400  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  high  beneficent  purpose  behind  this  bleak  world 
of  envy  and  self-interest.  With  a  freedom  hardly 
conceivable  in  any  reproduction  of  temporal  and  local 
conditions,  he  here  demonstrates  the  refinement  of 
the  originally  faulty  or  unripened  characters  of  Lear 
and  Cordelia  on  the  rack  of  partly  self-imposed  suffer- 
ing into  the  noblest,  tenderest,  and  most  perfect  types 
of  mortal  being. 

Only  in  a  single  play  of  his  maturity  —  probably  of 
his  entire  career  —  does  Shakespeare  give  any  indica- 
tion of  following  the  bent  of  the  time  in  concentrating 
attention  upon  the  humorous  detail  of  life  without 
reference  to  its  proper  function  as  the  interpreter  and 
corrective  of  more  idealistic  tendencies.  "The  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor"  stands  out  conspicuous  in  the  list 
of  Shakespeare's  works  as  the  only  play  which  the  poet 
localizes  in  the  England  of  his  own  age,  even  as  it  is 
the  only  one  in  which  interest  in  ludicrous  situation 
finally  predominates  over  the  graver  ends  of  charac- 
terization and  philosophy  of  life.  It  is,  indeed,  far  from 
being  a  narrowly  realistic  comedy  after  the  model  of 
the  popular  "comedy  of  manners."  The  humor  of  Fal- 
staff  and  the  merry  wives  is,  upon  the  whole,  clean  and 
hearty;  the  slight  underplot  of  Anne  Page  and  Fenton 
adds  a  welcome  dash  of  romance;  and  the  fairy  ma- 
chinery of  the  last  act  is  pretty  obviously  introduced 
for  the  purpose  of  freshening  the  close  atmosphere  of 
scheming  and  deceit.  Yet  the  play  undoubtedly  indi- 
cates a  departure  in  the  direction  of  that  species  of 
comedy  which  arises  by  the  evaporation  out  of  life  of 
its  grosser  details,  and  which,  in  the  face  of  Shake- 
speare's general  protest,  was  growing  more  and  more 
fashionable. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  401 

There  is  every  reason  for  accepting  the  essential 
truth  of  the  story,  reported  by  Dennis  and  Rowe,1  that 
the  "Merry  Wives"  was  composed  in  haste  to  the 
special  order  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  who  demanded  to 
see  Falstaff  in  love.  The  standard  of  taste  which  would 
prompt  such  a  desire  was  easily  intelligible  to  Shake- 
speare, and  within  certain  limitations  he  seems  not  to 
have  been  above  gratifying  it.2  The  suspicion  lies  very 
strong  that  in  this  comedy  the  character  of  Falstaff  has 
suffered  foul  play  with  the  entire  privity  of  the  author. 
One  may  borrow  the  words  spoken  of  Oldcastle  in  the 
Epilogue  to  "Henry  IV"  (Part  II)  and  say  that  Fal- 
staff "died  a  martyr"  in  "Henry  V,"  "and  this  is  not 
the  man."  We  have  seen  how  the  irresistible  figure 
of  the  true  Falstaff  —  the  incomparable  expression  of 
supreme  intellect  focussed  upon  the  physical  details  of 
life  —  swelled  out  the  Henry  IV  plays  beyond  their 
normal  size,  and  came  near  to  swamping  entirely  their 
serious  purpose.  It  would  seem  likely  that  Shake- 
speare has  taken  the  opportunity  in  "The  Merry 
Wives  of  Windsor"  of  effectually  cutting  the  throat  of 
this  lovable  but  ungovernable  giant  by  an  intentional 
travesty  of  his  character,  which  pleased  without  in- 
flaming the  vulgar  appetite  of  the  public.  Thus,  the 
play  would  remain  an  historical  document  measuring 
very  accurately  both  the  strength  of  the  general  de- 
mand, about  1599,  for  realistic  comedy  and  also  the 
attitude  of  Shakespeare  toward  the  type. 

1  See  N.  Smith,  Eighteenth  Century  Essays  on  Shakespeare,  1903. 
5  and  304. 

*  The  most  notable  examples  of  Shakespeare's  occasional  willing- 
ness to  sacriflce  art  in  the  interest  of  popular  appeal  are  probably 
the  unnatural  situations  presented  in  the  closing  acts  of  the  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona  and  Measure  for  Measure. 


402  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

The  evolution  of  realistic  comedy  as  a  distinct  dra- 
matic species  was  the  result  of  a  tendency  to  isolate 
and  catalogue  the  peculiarities  of  the  various  classes 
of  contemporary  society.  The  developed  comedy  of 
this  sort  gained  its  ends  almost  solely  by  caricature  of 
types  rather  than  by  individual  portraiture;  but  dur- 
ing the  last  five  or  six  years  of  Elizabeth's  reign  the 
species  took  its  rise  from  a  very  miscellaneous  set  of 
performances. 

Undoubtedly,  Ben  Jonson  is  in  the  highest  degree 
responsible  for  this  comedy,  as  regards  both  the  struc- 
tural form  which  it  took  and  the  critical  principles 
upon  which  it  was  based.  Quite  simultaneously  with 
Jonson 's  earliest  comedies  appeared,  however,  several 
by  George  Chapman,  which  exemplify  in  less  positive 
and  influential  form  many  of  the  same  general  ten- 
dencies. Chapman  agreed  with  Jonson  in  being  both  a 
scholar  and  a  frequent  imitator  of  the  classics.  The 
plays  of  these  writers  gave  the  situations  and  the  stock 
characters  of  Plautus  and  Terence  remarkable  fre- 
quence on  the  early  seventeenth-century  stage,  im- 
buing realistic  comedy  with  a  certain  Latin  coloring 
which  is  distinguishable  not  merely  in  actual  imita- 
tions like  "All  Fools"  and  "The  Alchemist,"  but  even 
also  in  such  essentially  original  works  as  "Eastward 
Hoe"  and  "Bartholomew  Fair." 

The  first  comedies  of  Chapman  and  Jonson  contain 
only  incidental  suggestions  of  the  realistic  method. 
Chapman's  "Blind  Beggar  of  Alexandria,"  which  may 
have  been  composed  as  early  as  1596,  is  in  point  of 
structure  a  monstrous  absurdity.  A  sensational  tragic 
theme,  dealing  with  the  ingenious  villainies  of  a  shep- 
herd's son  in  fourfold  disguise,  is  suddenly  brought 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  403 

to  an  entirely  unsatisfactory  comic  conclusion.  The 
main  story  is  as  far  removed  from  actual  fact  as  it  is 
from  the  requirements  of  art;  yet  the  treatment  of  the 
three  bourgeois  sisters  hi  their  quest  and  experience 
of  matrimony  brings  into  the  play  a  fitful  glimpse  of 
London  realism,  and  suggests  many  more  developed 
portraits  of  the  same  type. 

Two  early  plays  of  Ben  Jonson  illustrate  the  forma- 
tive stage  in  that  poet's  comic  method.  "The  Case  Is 
Altered "  is  in  the  main  an  attractive  piece  of  roman- 
tic apprentice  work,  based  upon  the  old  motive  of 
infant  confusion,  which  was  early  introduced  from 
Latin  and  Italian  drama.1  The  most  individual  part 
of  the  play,  however,  and  the  only  part  which  has 
significance  in  the  light  of  Jonson's  later  career,  is  that 
dealing  with  the  subsidiary  humors  of  Juniper  the 
cobbler,  Peter  Onion,  and  their  companions. 

"A  Tale  of  a  Tub  "  is  a  far  more  Jonsonian  work 
than  "The  Case  Is  Altered."  It  concerns  itself  exclu- 
sively with  contemporary  London  types,  most  of  which 
are  presented  with  real  wit  and  appreciation.  Limiting 
its  action  strictly  to  the  compass  of  a  single  day  and 
to  the  immediate  suburbs  of  London,  the  play  develops 
rather  amusingly  a  thin  story  of  mutual  deceit  and 
misunderstanding.  The  date  of  this  piece  is  somewhat 
uncertain.  It  was  not  printed  till  three  years  after 
Jonson's  death,2  but  it  seems  to  have  been  composed 
in  its  earliest  form  before  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 

1  The  original  source  of  this  theme  was  doubtless  the  Captivi  of 
Plautus,  which  was  directly  imitated  in  The  Case  Is  Altered.  The 
same  motive  had  been  employed  with  variations  in  The  Bugbeari, 
Misogonua,  and  The  Weakest  Goeth  to  the  Wall. 

*  In  the  10 10  Folio  edition  of  his  works. 


404  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tury.  Immaturity  appears  in  the  attempt  to  offer  a 
mere  series  of  comic  situations  in  place  of  an  ordered 
plot,  and  in  the  failure  to  endow  the  figures  with  any 
really  representative  value.  In  these  respects  "A 
Tale  of  a  Tub,"  like  Porter's  overrated  "Two  Angry 
Women  of  Abingdon"  (1599)  of  the  same  approxi- 
mate date,  bears  less  relationship  to  the  realistic  com- 
edy of  Jonson's  maturity  than  to  unreasoned  earlier 
efforts  at  plebeian  farce  such  as  "Gammer  Gurton's 
Needle"  and  "Misogonus." 

For  a  number  of  years  there  existed  a  parallel  and  a 
rather  close  connection  between  the  dramatic  careers 
of  Chapman  and  Jonson.  Both  appear  first  as  hack 
writers  for  Henslowe's  company,  and  it  is  difficult  to 
distinguish  between  their  early  theories  of  comedy. 
Professor  Parrott  has  remarked  1  that  Jonson  con- 
structed his  "Case  Is  Altered"  out  of  the  "Captivi" 
and  "Aulularia"  of  Plautus  in  the  very  same  year  in 
which  Chapman  was  similarly  fusing  the  plots  of  two 
Terentian  plays  2  in  "All  Fools."  The  idea  of  imita- 
tion in  the  ordinary  sense  is  here  precluded  by  the 
radical  difference  between  the  plays  in  question.  It  is 
worth  noting  that  "All  Fools"  would  make  no  very 
surprising  figure  in  the  gallery  of  Jonsonian  realism,  — 
beside  "Every  Man  in  his  Humor"  and  "Epiccene," 
for  example.  Conversely,  "The  Case  Is  Altered," 
which  is  strikingly  opposed  to  Jonson's  other  work 
and  was  never  openly  avowed  by  that  poet,  shows 
considerable  resemblance  to  several  of  Chapman's 
medleys  of  buffoonery  and  Latinized  romance,  such 
as  "May  Day"  and  "Monsieur  D'Olive." 

1  Chapman's  All  Fools  and  Gentleman  Usher,  Belles- Lcttres  ed. 
p.  xxxvi.  2  \{t.,  llcautontiinorumcnos  and  Adelphi. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  405 

So,  with  reference  to  Jonson's  peculiar  speciality, 
the  evolution  of  the  "comedy  of  humors,"  Chapman 
appears  concurrently  in  the  field.  It  is  hardly  possi- 
ble to  decide  whether  the  honor  of  prior  exemplification 
of  this  type  should  rest  with  "Every  Man  in  his  Hu- 
mor" or  with  the  "Humorous  Day's  Mirth"  of  the 
other  writer.  The  question  is  not  one  which  can  affect 
our  ultimate  judgment  concerning  the  relative  position 
of  the  two  poets  concerned.  Chapman's  "Humorous 
Day's  Mirth,"  mentioned  by  Henslowe  in  May,  1597, 
as  the  "Comedy  of  Humors,"  is  a  piece  of  no  distinc- 
tion and  of  no  perceptible  influence  in  its  own  day; 
while  Jonson's  much  better  thought  out  and  better 
constructed  comedy  created  a  new  epoch  in  drama- 
turgy. It  is  by  no  means  improbable  that  Jonson  and 
Chapman  worked  side  by  side,  with  considerable  ex- 
change of  ideas,  from  the  time  of  their  emergence  as 
dramatic  writers  in  the  pay  of  Henslowe  till  after  their 
formal  collaboration  in  "Eastward  Hoe"  (1605).  Be- 
ing both  poets  of  a  scholarly  and  reflective  tempera- 
ment, they  appear  to  have  striven  equally  for  the 
introduction  upon  the  English  stage  of  classic  plot 
material  and  for  the  application  to  contemporary 
society  of  the  neat  if  soulless  scale  of  stock  types  upon 
which  the  Latin  and  Italian  comedies  were  based. 
There  is  no  indication,  however,  that  Chapman  ever 
attained  to  a  permanent  theory  of  comic  composition 
or  evolved  any  consistent  method.  Romance,  which 
is  often  colorless,  and  blunt  realism,  which  is  not 
always  humorously  effective,  huddle  each  other  in 
his  latest  plays  no  less  than  in  the  earliest.  Indeed, 
"All  Fools,"  which  in  its  original  form  would  appear 
to  have  been  one  of  the  first  of  Chapman's  comedies, 


406  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

remains  on  the  whole  the  most  satisfactory  in  plot 
manipulation  and  in  conception. 

Thus  Chapman  seems  to  have  lent  to  the  progress 
of  realistic  comedy  little  more  than  the  original  half- 
blind  impulse  which  helped  to  start  it  on  its  way.  In 
the  shaping  of  its  course  he  took  small  part;  and  the 
main  interest  of  his  seven  or  eight 1  independent  come- 
dies for  the  student  of  dramatic  evolution  rests  not  in 
any  consecutive  advance  which  they  made  toward  the 
final  differentiation  of  a  comedy  of  English  types.  It 
lies  rather,  as  Professor  Parrott  has  again  suggested,2 
in  the  fact  that  his  unprogressive  series  of  plays,  half- 
romantic  and  half-realistic,  form  a  connecting  medium 
between  the  frank  heterogeneity  of  much  undeveloped 
Elizabethan  drama  and  the  brilliant,  but  quite  unlife- 
like  and  insincere  blending  of  various  interests  in 
Fletcher's  tragi-comedy. 

Ben  Jonson  created  realistic  comedy  as  a  distinct 
type  with  established  laws  and  a  clear-cut  field  of 
action.  "Every  Man  in  his  Humor"  translated  into 
terms  of  contemporary  life  a  number  of  the  most  suc- 
cessful characters  of  Plautine  drama :  the  miles  gloriosus 
in  Bobadill,  the  intriguing  slave  in  Brainworm,  the 
riotous  son  and  severe  father  in  the  Knowells.  To  these 
are  added  similar  stock  figures  in  the  town  and  coun- 
try gull,  the  merry  magistrate,  jealous  husband,  and 
"downright"  country  squire.  "Every  Man  in  his 
Humor"  was  perhaps  the  most  sensational  stage  suc- 

1  Eastward  Hoe,  in  which  Chapman  was  aided  by  Jonson  and 
Marston,  is  not  included  in  this  reckoning.    The  doubtful  piece  is 
Sir  Giles  Goosecap  (1606),  concerning  which,  see  T.  M.  Parrott, 
Modern  Philology,  1906. 

2  All  Foolu  and  Gentleman  Usher,  Bdles-Lettres  ed.,  p.  xliv,  ff. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  407 

cess  of  the  close  of  the  sixteenth  century,  and  it  taught 
the  dramatists  of  the  day  to  marshal  human  society 
into  classes  and  genera  instead  of  seeking  to  deal  with 
the  individual  person.  When  this  change  had  become 
complete,  Elizabethan  comedy  had  yielded  place  to 
Jacobean. 

With  the  single  exception  of  "Poetaster,"  a  play  of 
personal  satire  evoked  by  the  "Wrar  of  the  Theatres," 
in  1601,  all  the  comedies  of  Jonson  published  in  the 
1616  edition  of  his  works  are  based  upon  this  theory 
of  class  peculiarities  or  "humors,"  which  Jonson 
steadily  developed  and  made  more  and  more  capable 
of  expressing  the  externalities  of  Stuart  Kfe.  The 
growing  skill  of  the  poet  in  conveying  a  brilliant  criti- 
cism of  contemporary  conditions  by  means  of  vaguely 
individualized  model-figures  reached  its  apex  in  the 
intricate  anti-Puritan  satire  of  "Bartholomew  Fair," 
acted  in  1614,  but  first  published  in  the  second  Folio 
of  1640. 

"Every  Man  in  his  Humor,"  as  Jonson  originally 
composed  it,  and  as  it  was  published  in  1601,  had  an 
Italian  setting.  Before  the  appearance  of  the  first 
Folio  edition  in  1616,  the  scene  had  been  frankly 
shifted  to  London,  and  the  Italian  dramatis  personce 
rechristened  Englishmen.  This  change  has  more  sig- 
nificance than  may  appear,  for  realistic  comedy  only 
became  an  independent  type  when  it  restricted  itself 
to  the  neighborhood  of  contemporary  London  and  thus 
defeated  the  impulse  to  romantic  contamination.  The 
plays  which  blend  careful  sketches  of  English  real  life 
with  alien  non-realistic  plots  and  foreign  names  belong 
in  the  main  to  the  Elizabethan  dramatic  method,  and 
are  far  more  frequent  before  1603  than  after  that  date. 


408  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Such  are,  of  course,  the  dramas  of  Shakespeare,  who 
never  gives  realism  undisputed  control  of  his  stage. 

The  transitional  years,  1598- 1603,  produced  a  num- 
ber of  other  comedies  which  cater  to  the  rising  inter- 
est in  actual  city  types,  while  still  clinging  to  the 
usual  older  themes  as  well.  The  most  successful  of 
these  efforts  to  fuse  the  old  style  with  the  new  is  per- 
haps the  "Patient  Grissell"  of  Dekker,  Chettle,  and 
Haughton,  which  was  acted  early  in  1600. l  In  this 
play,  where  the  workmanship  of  Dekker  is  through- 
out very  conspicuous,  the  meeting  of  the  two  spirits 
is  so  clear  that  it  must  impress  the  hastiest  reader. 
The  treatment  of  the  delicate  story  of  Griseldis  and 
the  presentation  of  the  idyllic  poverty  of  her  father's 
household  render  the  main  plot  an  altogether  charm- 
ing example  of  Elizabethan  romance.  Dekker  has 
nowhere  given  expression  to  the  unpruned  luxuriance 
of  the  Elizabethan  imagination  in  finer  verse  than  that 
of  the  Marquess's  introductory  eulogy  on  hunting :  — 

"  Oh!  't  is  a  lovely  habit,  when  green  youth, 
Like  to  the  flowery  blossom  of  the  spring, 
Conforms  his  outward  habit  to  his  mind. 
Look  how  yon  one-ey'd  waggoner  of  heaven 
Hath,  by  his  horses'  fiery-winged  hoofs, 
Burst  ope  the  melancholy  jail  of  night; 
And  with  his  gilt  beams'  cunning  alchymy 
Turn'd  all  these  clouds  to  gold,  who,  with  the  winds 
Upon  their  misty  shoulders,  bring  in  day. 
Then  sully  not  this  morning  with  foul  looks, 
But  teach  your  jocund  spirits  to  ply  the  chase, 
For  hunting  is  a  sport  for  emperors." 

Nor  can  there  easily  be  found  a  more  pleasing  instance 
1  See  Henslowe's  Diary,  ed.  Greg,  vol.  ii,  206,  207. 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  409 

of  the  ultra-romantic  treatment  of  humble  life  than  in 
Janiculo's  speech  to  his  son:  l  — 

"  Come,  sit  by  me.    While  I  work  to  get  bread, 
And  Grissil  spin  us  yarn  to  clothe  our  backs, 
Thou  shall  read  doctrine  to  us  for  the  soul. 
Then,  what  shall  we  three  want  ?  nothing,  my  son; 
For  when  we  cease  from  work,  even  in  that  while, 
My  song  shall  charm  grief's  ears,  and  care  beguile." 

So  the  clownish  servant,  Babulo,  who  waits  upon 
Janiculo's  family  with  a  tenderness  thinly  disguised 
under  witty  impudence,  is  an  essentially  romantic 
creation,  owing  little  to  contemporary  observation, 
and  quite  unfettered  to  any  particular  time  or  place. 
He  belongs  to  the  kindred  of  Touchstone,  and  has  no 
connection  with  the  Brainworms  of  the  realistic  school. 

With  this  story  of  Griseldis,  which  forms  in  itself 
a  perfect  romantic  comedy,  has  been  combined  an  ut- 
terly different  realistic  plot  centring  about  the  Welsh 
widow  Gwenthyan.  The  idea  of  relieving  the  exces- 
sive self-abasement  of  Grissell  by  the  companion  pic- 
ture of  a  termagant  wife  is  one  which  Chaucer  would 
have  approved;  and  the  joining  of  the  themes  is  rather 
skilfully  effected.  Nothing,  however,  has  been  done 
to  conceal  the  entire  dissimilarity  of  the  two  strains 
involved.  Gwenthyan  and  her  two  suitors,  Sir  Owen 
ap  Meredith  and  Emulo,  are  clearly  realistic  types 
after  the  new  manner  of  Jonson.  It  seems  impossible 
to  doubt  that  Emulo  is  a  conscious  echo  of  Fastidious 
Brisk  in  "Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor."  Indeed, 
Emulo's  fantastic  account  of  his  bloodless  duel  with 
Sir  Owen2  follows  so  close  upon  Jonson's  description 

1  Collier's  edition,  1841,  p.  11.  *  Ibid.,  pp.  40-42. 


410  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  the  engagement  between  Brisk  and  Luculento 
("Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor,"  IV,  iv),  that  it 
may  fairly  be  held  to  pass  the  limits  of  justifiable 
imitation. 

This  bit  of  plagiarism,  together  with  a  mischievous 
allusion  to  the  fact  that  the  illiterate  Emulo  can 
"never  be  saved  by  his  book,"  l  may  well  have  irri- 
tated Jonson  and  caused  Dekker  to  be  joined  with 
Marston  in  the  next  year's  satire  of  the  "Poetaster" 
(1601).  That  Dekker  was  indeed  mainly  responsible 
lor  this  sub-plot  in  the  new  realistic  style  of  Jonson 
is  pretty  evident  from  the  recurrence  of  the  identical 
theme  and  figures  in  the  Mistress  Miniver  and  Sir 
Rees  ap  Vaughan  episode  of  his  "Satiromastix" 
(1601). 

Jonsonian  influence  appears  to  have  introduced  a 
streak  of  realistic  satire  into  a  number  of  other  mot- 
ley plays  produced  during  the  last  five  years  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign.  The  manuscript  comedy  of  "Timon," 
first  printed  by  Dyce  in  1842,  unites  with  a  light- 
hearted  treatment  of  the  story  of  the  Athenian  mis- 
anthrope a  Latinizing  farce  of  stock  types,  among 
which  occur  such  familiar  figures  as  the  covetous 
father  and  clownish  son,  the  vain  foolish  lover,  mis- 
chievous page,  and  wanton  nurse.  The  source  of  this 
play,  the  circumstances  of  presentation,  and  its  rela- 
tion to  Shakespeare's  tragedy  on  the  same  subject 
are  all  matters  of  dispute.  In  the  light  of  recent  in- 
vestigation, it  seems  probable  that  the  play  before  us 

1  An  allusion  to  pardon  "by  benefit  of  clergy,"  to  which  Jonson 
had  owed  his  life  in  1598.  Compare  the  reference  to  "some  that 
have  been  saved  by  their  neck-verse"  in  connection  with  Horace 
(Jonson)  in  Satiromastix  (Scherer's  ed.,  1.  384). 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  411 

—  in  Spite  of  an  air  of  academic  exclusiveness  which  ig 
carried  even  to  the  length  of  quoting  Greek  in  the 
original  —  was  known  to  Shakespeare,  and  that  it 
supplied  him  with  important  elements  in  his  tragedy 
which  he  could  have  procured  from  no  other  known 
source.  The  unknown  author  of  "Timon,"  while 
standing  creditor  to  Shakespeare,  may  have  been 
debtor  to  Ben  Jonson,  for  a  remarkably  close  parallel 
has  been  lately  pointed  out  between  his  sketches  of 
Gelasimus  and  Pseudocheus  and  those  of  Amorphus 
and  Asotus  in  "Cynthia's  Revels." l 

In  the  "Parnassus"  plays  —  likewise  academic 
productions  of  about  the  same  date  (1598-1601)  — 
we  can  trace  the  gradual  influence,  if  not  of  Jonson's 
personal  example,  certainly  of  the  type  of  local  comedy 
based  on  classic  models,  which  Jonson  individualized 
and  established  on  the  English  stage.  In  the  first  play 
of  the  group,  "The  Pilgrimage  to  Parnassus,"  which 
was  acted  at  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge,  about 
Christmas,  1597,  we  have  a  mere  allegory  of  the  vari- 
ous tasks  and  employments  of  college  life,  with  no 
further  attempt  at  comic  effect  than  can  be  made  out 
of  local  references  to  Hobson  the  carrier  and  "ray 
hoste  Johns  of  the  Crowne."  The  two  parts  of  "The 
Return  from  Parnassus,"  which  complete  the  trilogy, 
(1600,  1601  ?)  are  conspicuous,  on  the  other  hand,  for 
the  increasing  degree  in  which  they  subordinate  the 
original  allegorical  motive  to  the  delineation  of  real- 

1  See  C.  R.  Baskervill,  English  Elements  in  Jonson' a  Early  Comedy, 
268-272,  and  H.  C.  Hart,  Jonson's  Works,  I,  xliv.  It  should  be  said 
that  the  general  character  of  the  parallel  passages  seems  to  suggest 
a  common  source  rather  than  deliberate  imitation  on  the  part  of 
either  English  poet. 


412  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

istic  types.  The  first  part  of  the  "Return"  contains 
a  convincing  scene  between  the  Cambridge  Draper, 
Tailor,  and  Inn-keeper,  who  meet  to  complain  of  stu- 
dents' bad  debts.  Gullio  in  the  same  play  repeats  the 
comedy  of  Master  Matthew  in  "Every  Man  in  his 
Humor,"  with  his  inanity,  his  absurd  poetic  ambition 
and  his  pilfered  tags  of  verse;  while  a  life-like  passage 
describing  Ingenioso's  visit  to  his  Patron  handles  with 
admirable  fidelity  a  situation  otherwise  treated  but 
hardly  improved  in  "The  Puritan." 

In  the  second  part  of  the  "Return,"  the  symbolical 
story  of  Ingenioso,  Judicio,  Studioso,  Academico,  etc., 
is  so  complicated  by  realistic  additions  of  every  kind 
as  to  be  almost  entirely  unintelligible.  It  is  every- 
where obvious  that  the  interest  of  the  author  has  been 
distracted  from  the  general  allegorical  framework  of 
the  piece  to  the  series  of  ironic  studies  of  contemporary 
manners  which  he  has  embroidered  upon  it;  and  the 
unique  value  of  this  curious  play  results  from  the  can- 
dor with  which  it  devotes  itself  to  the  delineation  and 
criticism  of  present  conditions  in  a  very  great  num- 
ber of  the  avenues  of  life. 

The  recently  recovered  play  of  "Club  Law,"  as- 
signed by  its  editor  to  a  date  (1599-1600)  about  level 
with  that  of  the  second  member  of  the  "Parnassus" 
group,  illustrates  with  equal  vividness  the  satirical 
propensities  of  the  Cambridge  undergraduate  stage. 
It  is  not  possible,  however,  to  bring  "  Club  Law  "  into 
any  such  direct  relationship  with  the  drama  at  large 
as  the  last  two  Parnassus  plays  everywhere  exhibit. 
"Club  Law"  owes  its  peculiar  interest  to  its  frankly 
occasional  nature.  Instead  of  treating  general  types  of 
character,  it  aims  its  satire  at  unpopular  individuals 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  413 

among  the  Cambridge  townsmen;  and  it  thus  has  its 
raison  d'etre,  not  in  the  philosophic  analysis  of  existing 
society,  which  was  becoming  more  and  more  the  theme 
of  professional  London  comedy,  but  in  the  mere  grati- 
fication of  academic  pique. 

Two  other  plays,  which  belong  presumably  to  the 
very  last  years  of  Elizabeth,  mark  the  transition  to 
realistic  comedy.  Both  are  shown  by  the  large  number 
of  extant  editions  to  have  been  among  the  most  popu- 
lar performances  of  the  time  with  the  reading  public. 
One  of  these  plays,  "Wily  Beguiled,"  was  first  printed 
in  1606,  the  year  in  which  the  second  part  of  "The 
Return  from  Parnassus"  appeared,  and,  like  the  other 
piece,  was  acted  probably  several  years  earlier.  That 
"Wily  Beguiled"  was  originally  an  academic  play  is 
almost  certain,  in  spite  of  its  broad  general  vogue  later, 
from  the  glee  with  which  the  triumph  of  the  poor 
scholar  over  his  worldly  rivals  is  depicted,  and  from 
the  excessive  affectation  of  much  of  the  verse.  Col- 
lege dilettantism  may  be  responsible  for  the  presence 
of  two  good  songs  as  well  as  for  the  large  number  of 
instances  of  verbal  plagiarism  and  the  incongruous 
introduction  of  Sylvanus,  Nymphs,  and  Satyrs.  The 
chief  interest  of  the  play  consists,  however,  in  the 
realistic  scenes  which  deal  with  Gripe,  Churms,  Plod- 
All,  and  Will  Cricket.  As  regards  these  scenes,  "Wily 
Beguiled"  occupies  an  important  halfway  position 
between  Lyly's  Latinized  comedy  of  "Mother  Bom- 
bie,"  which  our  play  much  resembles  in  plot,  and  the 
mature  Stuart  plays  of  English  real  life. 

"A  Pleasant  conceited  Comedie,  Wherein  is  shewed 
how  a  Man  may  Choose  a  good  Wife  from  a  Bad" 
has  been  ascribed  on  insubstantial  grounds  to  Thomas 


Heywood.1  This  play,  like  "Wily  Beguiled,"  is  distin- 
guished by  its  unblushing  plagiarism;  and  the  most 
memorable  thing  about  it  is  perhaps  the  travesty  of 
the  potion  story  in  "Romeo  and  Juliet."  The  figures 
in  the  comedy,  though  all  nominally  English  and  con- 
temporary, are  depicted  either  vaguely  or  with  undue 
exaggeration;  nor  is  the  plot  construction  sufficiently 
good  to  reflect  credit  upon  the  dramatic  taste  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  which  required  seven  editions 
within  thirty-three  years.  The  play's  hold  on  the 
public  doubtless  lay  in  the  absurdities  of  the  clownish 
school-master,  Sir  Aminadab,  and  in  the  sentimental 
presentation  of  the  trials  of  the  patient  wife,  —  a 
theme  apparently  popular  at  this  time  and  similarly 
treated  in  "The  London  Prodigal." 

With  the  curious  symmetry  which  not  infrequently 
characterizes  literary  movements,  it  happened  that  the 
efflorescence  of  Stuart  realism  in  comedy  coincided 
precisely  with  the  beginning  of  James  I's  reign.  The 
plays  just  considered,  belonging  to  the  last  five  years 
of  the  Tudor  period,  are  all  experimental  in  character; 
and,  with  the  exception  of  "Every  Man  in  his  Hu- 
mor," they  all  contain  nearly  or  quite  as  much  of  the 
Elizabethan  as  of  the  later  spirit.  Even  in  Jonson's 
"Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor"  and  "  Cynthia's  Rev- 
els" (1601),  we  have  elaborate  preliminary  studies  in 
type  portraiture  rather  than  finished  dramas  in  the 
new  style. 

The  four  or  five  years  immediately  subsequent  to 

James  I's  accession  in  1603  are  remarkable  for  an  ex- 

traordinary outburst  of  realistic  comedy.  To  the  years 

1603-1608  belong  "The  London  Prodigal"  and  "The 

1  See  Fleay,  Biog.  Chron.  Eng.  Drama,  i,  289  f.       M 


x 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  415 

Puritan"  (1607),  "Eastward  Hoe"  by  Jonson,  Chap- 
man, and  Marston,  the  "Westward  Hoe"  and  "North- 
ward Hoe"  of  Dekker  and  Webster,  and  Jonson's 
"Volpone."  The  same  years  saw  the  production  also 
of  five  admirable  comedies  by  Middleton,  who  ranks 
with  Jonson  as  the  finest  exponent  of  Stuart  realism: 
"Michaelmas  Term"  (1607),  "A  Trick  to  Catch  the 
Old  One"  (1608),  "The  Family  of  Love"  (1608), 
"Your  Five  Gallants"  (registered,  March,  1608),  and 
"A  Mad  World,  My  Masters." 

No  true  parallel  to  any  of  these  plays  can  be  found 
among  the  productions  of  the  real  Elizabethans.  Yet 
these  form  the  most  distinct  and  vigorous  class  of 
drama  produced  by  the  younger  poets  in  the  eight  or 
nine  years  (1603-1611/12)  during  which  Shakespeare 
was  triumphantly  maintaining  the  old  catholic  art  upon 
the  Globe  stage  in  the  face  of  a  general  yielding  else- 
where to  more  temporary  interests.  With  the  single 
exception  of  "Volpone,"  the  principal  scene  of  these 
plays  is  always  London.  Without  any  exception,  the 
group  is  characterized  by  a  restriction  of  view  to  the 
most  tangible  and  superficial  phenomena  of  worldly  ex- 
perience. Just  in  proportion  as  Jonson  and  his  fellows 
acquired  their  consummate  mastery  in  interpreting 
the  actual  impressions  of  eye  and  ear,  they  lost  touch 
with  the  inner  voice  of  ideal  fancy.  Thus,  the  imagina- 
tion, divorced  from  reason  and  observation,  was  left 
to  find  expression  in  works  of  dishonest  sentiment  and 
morbid  horror. 


416  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A.  PLAYS  PABTIALLT  REALISTIC  HAVING  A  FOREIGN  SETTING 
(SHAKESPEAREAN  PLATS  OMITTED) 

/CHAPMAN,  GEORGE.  Dramatic  Works,  1873,  3  vols.  ;  ed.  R.  H. 
Shepherd,  1874, 1889.  General  discussion :  E.  Koeppel,  "  Quel- 
len-Studien  zu  den  Dramen  George  Chapman's,  Philip  Mas- 
singer's  uud  John  Ford's,"  1897  ;  A.  L.  Stiefel, "  George  Chap- 
fman  und  das  italienische  Drama,"  Sh.  Jb.,  35  (1899),  180- 
213. 

The  Blind  Beggar  of  Alexandria,  "  most  pleasantly  dis- 
coursing his  variable  humours  in  disguised  shapes,"  1598. 
A  Humorous  Day's  Mirth,  1599. 

All  Fools,  1605.  Reprinted  in  Reed's  and  Collier's  Dodsley  ; 
Ancient  British  Drama,  ii,  1810 ;  W.  L.  Phelps,  Chapman, 
Mermaid  series;  T.  M.  Parrott,  Belles  Lettres  series,  1907. 
Discussion :  M.  Stier,  "  Chapman's  All  Fools  mit  Beriick- 
sichtigung  seiner  Quellen,"  Halle,  1904  ;  E.  Woodbridge, 
"  An  Unnoted  Source  of  Chapman's  All  Fools,"  Jrl.  Germ. 
Phil.,  i,  338-341. 

Monsieur  D'Olive,  1606.  Reprinted,  C.  W.  Dilke,  Old  Eng- 
lish Plays,  1814. 
The   Gentleman   Usher,    1606.   Reprinted,  T.  M.  Parrott, 

Belles  Lettres  series,  1907. 

May-Day,  1611.  Reprinted,  C.  W.  Dilke,  Old  English  Plays. 
The  Widow's  Tears,  1612.  Reprinted  in  Dodsley,  all  edd. 

except  Hazlitt. 

DEKKER,  CHETTLE,  and  HAUGHTON  :  Patient  Grissill,  1603. 
Reprinted,  J.  P.  Collier,  Shakespeare  Society,  1841  ;  A.  B.  Gro- 
sart,  Dekker's  "  Non-Dramatic  Works  "  (sic)  in  Huth  Library, 
v,  1886. 
JONSON,  BEN.  (For  collected  works,  etc.,  see  p.  418.) 

Every  Man  in  his  Humor.  Original  version,  with  Italian 
characters,  1601.  Reprinted,  C.  Grabau,  Sh.  Jb.,  38  (1902)  ; 
W.  W.  Greg,  Materialien,  x,  1905  ;  F.  E.  Schelling,  Every- 
man, Jouson,  i.  Discussion :  A.  Buff,  "  The  Quarto  Edition 
of  Ben  Jonson's  'Every  Man  in  his  Humour,'"  Engl.  Stud., 
i  (1877),  181  ff  ;  B.  Nicholson,  "  On  the  Dates  of  the  Two 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  417 

Versions  of  'Every  Man  in  his  Humour,'"  Antiquary,  vi 
(1882),  15-19,  106-110.  See  also  p.  418. 
The  Case  la  Altered,  1609  (two  issues).  Discussion  :   W. 
Sperrbake,  "  Beu  Jonson's  '  The  Case  is  Altered '  uud  seine 
Quellen,"  Halle,  1906. 
Poetaster,  "  Or  The  Arraignment,"  1602.    Reprinted,  H.  S. 

Mallory,  Yale  Studies,  xxvii,  1905. 

Volpone,  or  The  Fox.  First  printed  in  1616  Jonson  Folio. 
Reprinted,  Mermaid  Jonson,  vol.  iii ;  H.  B.  Wilkins,  1905. 
Discussion:  L.  H.  Holt,  "Notes  on  Jonson's  'Volpoue,'" 
Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xx  (1905),  63  ;  F.  Holthausen,  "  Die 
Quelle  von  Ben  Jonson's  'Volpone,'"  Anglia,  xu  (1889), 
619-525. 

MIDDLETON,  THOMAS.  (For  collected  editions,  etc.,  see  p.  419.) 
Blurt    Master  -  Constable,    "Or    The    Spaniards    Night- 
walk  i-,"  1602.  Reprinted,  W.  R.  Chetwood,  1750. 
Every  Woman  in  her  Humor,  1609.  Reprinted,  A.  H.  Bullen, 

Old  Plays,  iv,  1885. 

Timon.  MS.  Printed,  A.  Dyce,  Shakespeare  Society,  1842  ;  W. 
C.  Hazlitt,  "Shakespeare's  Library,"  vi,  1875.  Discussion: 
W.  H.  demons,  Princeton  Univ.  Bulletin,  1904  ;  J.  Q.  Adams, 
«  The  Timon  Plays,"  Jrl.  Eng.  and  Germ.  Phil.,  ix  (1910), 
506  ff  :  E.  H.  Wright,  "  The  Authorship  of  Timou  of  Athens," 
1910. 

B.  PLATS  OF  CONTEMPORARY  ENGLISH  LIFE 

CHAPMAN,  JONSON,  and  MARSTON  :  Eastward  Hoe,  1605  (two 
editions).  Reprinted  in  Dodsley,  all  edd.  except  Hazlitt  ;  An- 
cient British  Drama,  ii,  1810  ;  Marston's  Works,  ed.  Halliwell 
(1856)  and  Bullen  (1887)  ;  Works  of  Chapman,  ed.  R.  H.  Shep- 
herd, 1874,  1889  ;  F.  E.  Schelling,  Belles  Lettres  series,  1904. 
Discussion :  C.  Edmonds,  "  The  Original  of  the  Hero  in  the 
Comedy  of '  Eastward  Hoe,' "  Athenceum,  Oct.  13, 1883,  p.  463  f ; 
H.  D.  Curtis,  "The  Source  of  the  Petronel-Winifred  Plot  in 
•Eastward  Hoe,'"  Mod.  Phil.,  v  (1907),  105-108. 

DKKKKK.  THOMAS,  and  WEBSTER,  JOHN  :  Westward  Hoe, 
1607.  Reprinted,  A.  Dyce, "  Works  of  John  Webster,"  iii,  1830. 
Northward  Hoe,  1607.  Reprinted  ibid.  Discussion:  E.  E. 
Stoll,  "John  Webster,"  11X)5;  F.  E.  Pierce,  "The  Collab- 
oration of  Webster  and  Dekker,"  Yale  Studies,  xxxvii,  11)09. 


418  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

JONSON,  BEN.  Works,  1616  (Folio  containing  the  following  nine 
plays  :  "  Every  Man  in  his  Humor,"  "  Every  Man  out  of  his 
Humor,"  "Cynthia's  Revels,"  "Poetaster,"  "Sejauus,"  "The 
Fox,"  "  The  Silent  Woman,"  "  The  Alchemist,"  "  Catiline  "). 
Reprinted,  first  552  pages,  W.  Bang,  Materialien,  vii ;  remain- 
der in  press.  Second  edition  adding  a  supplementary  volume, 
containing  "Bartholomew  Fair,"  "The  Devil  is  an  Ass," 
"The  Staple  of  News,"  "The  Magnetic  Lady,"  "A  Tale  of  a 
Tub,"  "The  Sad  Shepherd,"  "Mortimer,"  1640  (two  issues). 
Third  edition,  1692,  adding  "The  New  Inn."  Important 
modern  editions :  P.  Whalley,  1756 ;  W.  Gifford,  1816  (new 
ed.  1879)  ;  F.  Cunningham,  1875  ;  H.  C.  Hart,  1906  ;  F.  E. 
Schelling,  Everyman's  Library.  A  critical  edition  by  P.  Simp- 
son is  in  preparation.  General  discussion :  P.  Aronstein,  "  Ben 
Jonson,"  Literarhistorische  Forschungen,  xxxiv,  1906 ;  C.  R. 
Baskervill,  "English  Elements  in  Jonson's  Early  Comedy," 
1911 ;  M.  Castelain,  °  Ben  Jonson :  1'Homme  et  1'CEuvre," 
1907  ;  H.  Hoffschulte,  "  Uber  Ben  Jonson's  altere  Lustspiele," 
1894;  F.  E.  Schelling,  "Ben  Jonson  and  the  Classical  School," 
Publ.  Mod.  Lang.  Assoc.,  xiii  (1898),  221  ff ;  A.  C.  Swinburne, 
"A  Study  of  Ben  Jonson,"  1889  ;  E.  Woodbridge,  "  Studies  in 
Jonson's  Comedy,"  Yale  Studies,  v,  1898. 
A  Tale  of  a  Tub.  First  printed  in  vol.  ii  of  the  second  Folio, 

1640. 

Every  Man  In  his  Humor.  (Revised  version  with  English 
characters.)  First  printed  in  1616  Folio.  Reprinted,  J.  Bell, 
British  Theatre,  1776,  etc.  ;  Modern  British  Drama,  iii,  1811; 
H.  B.  Wheatley,  1877,  etc.;  B.  Nicholson,  Mermaid  Jonson, 
i ;  W.  M.  Dixon,  Temple  Dramatists,  1896,  etc. 
Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor,  1600  (two  editions).  Re- 
printed, W.  Bang  and  W.  W.  Greg,  Materialien,  xvi,  xvii, 
1907 ;  B.  Nicholson,  Mermaid  Jonson,  i.  Discussion :  H.  C. 
Hart :  "  Carlo  Buffone  in  '  Every  Man  out  of  his  Humour,' " 
Notes  and  Queries,  Series  x,  i  (1904),  381-383. 
The  Fountain  of  Self-Love,  or  Cynthia's  Revels,  1601. 
Reprinted,  Mermaid  Jonson,  ii;  A.  C.  Jndson,  Yale  Studies 
(in  preparation). 

The  Alchemist,  1612.  (Stationer's  Register,  Oct.  3,  1610.) 
Reprinted  1709,  1732,  1740;  Bell's  British  Theatre,  1777, 
etc. ;  Modern  British  Drama,  1811 ;  W.  R.  Thayer,  Best 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  419 

Elizabethan  Plays,  1892 ;  B.  Nicholson,  Mermaid  Jonson, 
iii ;  C.  M.  Hathaway,  Yale  Studies,  xvii,  1903  ;  H.  C.  Hart, 
1903;  F.  E.  Schelling,  Belles  Lettres  series,  1904.  l)u- 
cussion:  F.  £.  Schelling,  Mod.  Lang.  Notes,  xxvi  (1911), 
62,63. 

Epicoene,  or  The  Silent  Woman.  "Acted  in  the  yeere 
1609."  Registered  Sept.  20,  1610.  Earliest  known  edition  in 
1616  Folio.  Reprinted  under  the  second  title,  1620.  Mod- 
ern editions:  B.  Nicholson,  Mermaid  Jonson,  iii ;  A.  Henry, 
Yale  Studies,  ixxi,  1906. 

Bartholomew  Fair.  "  Acted  in  the  Yeare  1614."  First  known 
edition,  with  separate  title-page  dated  1631,  included  in 
second  volume  of  Jonson's  Works,  1640.  Reprinted,  Mermaid 
Jonson,  ii :  C.  S.  Aldeu,  Yale  Studies,  xxv,  1904. 

The  Devil  is  an  Ass.  "Acted  in  the  yeare  1616."  First 
known  edition,  with  separate  title-page  dated  1631,  included 
in  the  second  volume  of  Jonson's  Works,  1640.  Reprinted, 
W.  S.  Johnson,  Yale  Studies,  xxiz,  1905.  Discussion :  E.  Holl- 
stein,  "  Das  Verhaltnis  von  Ben  Jonson's  '  The  Devil  is  an 
Ass,'  und  John  Wilson's  'Belphegor'  zu  Machiavelli's 
'  Novelle  von  Belfagor,' "  1901. 

The  Staple  of  News.  "  Acted  in  the  yeare  1625."  Regis- 
tered 1626.  First  known  edition,  with  separate  title-page 
dated  1631,  included  in  second  volume  of  Jonson's  Works, 
1640.  Reprinted  De  Winter,  Yale  Studies,  xxviii,  1905. 

The  New  Inn,  1631.  Acted  1629.  Reprinted  third  Jonson 
Folio,  1692.  New  ed.,  G.  B.  Tennant,  Yale  Studies,  xmv, 
1908. 

The  Magnetic  Lady.    First  printed  in  the  second  Jonson 

Folio,  1640.  Licensed,  Oct.,  1632. 
MIDDLE-TON,  THOMAS.   Works  ed.  A.  Dyce,  1840 ;  Ed.  A.  H. 

Bullen,  1885-86. 

Michaelmas  Term,  1607. 

A  Trick  to  Catch  the  Old  One.  "  Presented  before  his  Ma- 
iestie  on  New  yeares  night  last,"  1608  (two  issues).  Re- 
printed 1616.  Ed.  A.  C.  Swinburne,  Mermaid  Middleton, 
vol.  i. 

The  Family  of  Love,  1608. 

A  Mad  "World,  My  Masters,  1608.  Reprinted,  "Ancient 
British  Drama,"  1810. 


420  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Tour  Five  Gallants.  Two  editions  without  date.  Registered 
March  22,  1607. 

PORTER,  HENRY  :  The  Two  Angry  "Women  of  Abingdon, 
1599  (two  editions).  Reprinted,  A.  Dyce,  Percy  Society,  \,  1841 ; 
Hazlitt's  Dodsley,  vii,  1874 ;  Mermaid  series,  "  Nero,  etc.," 
1888;  C.  M.  Gayley,  Representative  English  Comedies,  1903. 

AUTHORS  UNKNOWN  :  Parnassus  Plays.  "The  Pilgrimage  to 
Parnassus"  and  the  First  Part  of  "The  Return  from  Parnas- 
sus," printed  from  a  Bodleian  MS.  by  W.  D.  Macray,  1886. 
The  Second  Part  of  "  The  Return  from  Parnassus,  Or  The 
Scourge  of  Simony,"  printed  1606  (two  editions).  Also  a  va- 
riant MS.  copy  among  Halliwell-Phillips's  papers.  Reprinted, 
T.  Hawkins,  Origin  of  the  English  Drama,  iii,  1773;  Ancient 
British  Drama,  i,  1810  ;  Hazlitt's  Dodsley,  ix,  1874  ;  E.  Arber, 
1879  ;  W.  D.  Macray  (critical  ed.),  1886  ;  O.  Smeaton,  Tem- 
ple Dramatists,  1905.  Discussion :  B.  Corney,  "  The  Return 
from  Parnassus  :  its  authorship,"  Notes  and  Queries,  Series  iii, 
ix,  387;  J.  W.  Hales,  "Three  Elizabethan  Comedies,"  Mac- 
millan's  Magazine,  1887  ;  W.  Luhr,  "  Die  Drei  Cambridger 
Spiele  vom  Parnass,"  1900. 

Club  Law.  MS.  in  St.  John's  Coll.,  Cambridge,  Printed,  G.  C. 
Moore  Smith,  1907. 

A  Pleasant  Conceited  Comedy  Wherein  is  Shewed  How 
a  Man  May  Choose  a  Good  Wife  from  a  Bad,  1602.  I  ,, 
Other  editions,  1605,  1608,  1614,  1621,  1630,  1634.  Reprinted,  *' 
"•The  Old  English  Drama,"  Hurst,  Robinson  &  Co.,  with  sep- 
arate title-page  dated  1824 ;  Hazlitt,  Dodsley,  ix,  1874.  Dis- 
cussion :  C.  R.  Baskervill,  "  Source  and  Analogues  of  How 
a  Man  May  Choose  a  Good  Wife  from  a  Bad,"  Publ.  Mod. 
Lang.  Assoc.,  xxiv  (1909). 

The  London  Prodigal,  1605.  "By  William  Shakespeare" 
(sic).  Reprinted  in  the  third  and  fourth  Shakespeare  Folios 
(1664,  1685).  For  further  bibliography,  see  The  Shakespeare 
Apocrypha. 

Sir  Giles  Goosecap,  Knight,  1606.  Reprinted,  A.  H.  Bullen, 
Old  English  Plays,  iii,  1884  ;  W.  Baug  and  R.  Brotanek,  Ma- 
terialien,  xxvi,  1909.  Discussion  :  T.  M.  Parrott,  "The  Author- 
ship of  Sir  Gyles  Goosecappe,"  Mod.  Phil.,  iv  (1906).  (Assigns 
very  substantial  reasons  for  attributing  the  play  to  Chap- 
man.) 


REALISTIC  COMEDY  421 

Wily  Beguiled,  1606.  Later  editions,  1623,  1630,  1635,  1638, 
and  one  other.  Reprinted,  T.  Hawkins,  Origin,  iii,  1773  ;  Haz- 
litt,  Dodsley,  ix. 

The  Puritan,  or  The  "Widow  of  Watling-Street,  1607. 
"  Written  by  W.  S."  Reprinted  in  the  third  and  fourth  Shake- 
speare Folios  (1664,  1685).  For  further  bibliography,  see 
The  Shakespeare  Apocrypha. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE   NATURE   OF   ELIZABETHAN   DRAMA 

THE  more  important  devices  of  staging  and  of  histri- 
onic practice  which  accompanied  the  development  of 
the  Tudor  drama  up  to  the  date  of  Elizabeth's  acces- 
sion have  been  discussed  in  the  earlier  chapters  of  this 
book.  It  remains  necessary  —  before  attempting  to 
sketch  in  some  sort  the  general  spirit  of  the  later  drama 
of  our  period  —  to  mention  briefly  the  external  changes 
and  innovations  to  which  the  theatre  managers  re- 
sorted during  the  last  thirty  or  forty  years  of  the 
sixteenth  century  in  their  breathless  effort  to  keep 
pace  with  the  unparalleled  growth  in  the  popularity 
and  complexity  of  their  wares. 

We  have  seen  that  a  distinction  was  clearly  recog- 
nized as  early  as  1530  between  the  indoor  and  out- 
door performance  of  plays,1  and  that  the  interlude  of 
this  period  developed  with  especial  regard  to  the  needs 
of  indoor,  semi-private  and  aristocratic  presentation. 
When  Elizabeth  came  to  the  throne,  in  1558,  the  case 
was  much  the  same.  There  still  co-existed  open-air 
plays  for  the  general  public  and  indoor  performances 
for  the  elite.  The  conditions  of  private  staging  had 
grown  far  more  elaborate,  however,  in  the  interval. 
The  locale,  for  which  any  gentleman's  house  seems 
previously  to  have  been  sufficient,  was  now  generally 
fixed  in  one  of  the  royal  palaces  of  Whitehall  or  Green- 
wich, in  the  great  dining  halls  of  the  Oxford  and  Carn- 
1  See  p.  69  f. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     423 

bridge  colleges  or  the  London  Inns  of  Court,  or  occa- 
sionally at  the  residence  of  some  great  noble.  The 
accounts  of  the  Revels  Office  bear  clear  witness  to  the 
constantly  increasing  gorgeousness  and  expensiveness 
of  such  entertainments.1  Each  decade  saw  enormously 
amplified  the  requisition  of  money  and  properties  to 
adorn  the  stage  or  dress  the  performers,  and  the  waste- 
ful tendency  exhausted  itself  finally  only  in  the  wild 
crushing  extravagance  of  the  Jacobean  masque.  The 
heightened  repute  of  private  theatricals  is  likewise 
indicated  by  the  rise  of  companies  of  amateur  per- 
formers by  the  side  of  the  old  professional  bands. 
Such  seem  to  have  been  ordinarily  the  actors  in  the 
collegiate  plays,  and  so  the  various  children's  com- 
panies of  choir-boys  should  doubtless  be  considered 
during  all  the  first  part  of  the  reign.  Through  the 
entire  quarter  century  following  the  Queen's  acces- 
sion all  that  was  most  significant  or  progressive  in 
English  drama  expressed  itself  in  these  private  and 
occasional  performances.  Practically  every  important 
play  of  this  time—  "Ferrex  and  Porrex,"  "Roister 
Doister,"  "Gammer  Gurton's  Needle,"  "The  Sup- 
poses" and  "Jocasta,"  "Gismond  of  Salerne,"  "The 
Misfortunes  of  Arthur,"  "The  Arraignment  of  Paris," 
and  the  early  comedies  of  Lyly  —  appeared  to  meet 
the  growing  needs  and  aspirations  of  the  indoor  stage. 
The  popular,  outdoor  theatre,  on  the  other  hand, 
remained  for  many  years  after  Elizabeth's  accession 
on  the  same  low  level  of  development  which  we  have 
found  illustrated  a  full  century  before  in  the  mise  en 
sc&ne  of  the  vulgarized  morality,  "Mankind."  The 

i  Cf.  A.  J.  Kempe,  Loteley  MSS.,  and  A.  Feufflerat,  Reveli 

Accovnts,  passim. 


424  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

professional  actors,  all  the  most  reputable  of  whom 
reserved  their  best  efforts  for  private  exhibition  in  the 
presence  of  noble  or  royal  patrons,  were  indeed  con- 
tent to  increase  their  profits  by  such  performances 
before  the  rabble  as  could  be  arranged  without  special 
preparation  or  outlay.  But  nearly  twenty  years  of  the 
Queen's  reign  passed  before  the  appearance  of  any 
disposition  to  consider  the  particular  requirements  and 
opportunities  of  the  popular  stage.  In  the  mean  time, 
the  public  was  offered  casual  amusement  in  the  open- 
air  theatres  which  chance  had  provided,  and  which  we 
have  found  the  rustic  mountebanks  of  "Mankind" 
already  employing,  —  namely,  in  the  uncovered  court- 
yards of  the  inns.  The  assemblages  here  collected  were 
regaled  either  with  the  rudest  effusions  of  traditional 
clownage  and  melodrama,  or  else  with  the  leavings 
of  the  more  cultured  audiences,  —  plays  intended  dis- 
tinctly for  private  presentation,  which  the  actors  hap- 
pened to  have  already  in  their  repertoire  or  which 
they  desired  to  rehearse  in  view  of  some  contemplated 
private  performance.  Thus  it  happens  that,  while  the 
fashionable  private  drama  is  found  making  continu- 
ous and  serious,  if  not  always  successful,  effort  at 
artistic  improvement,  the  career  of  the  popular  stage 
remains  till  about  1585  a  practical  blank;  and  the  na- 
tional drama  bursts  forth  into  immediate  and  unher- 
alded bloom  only  when  the  great  events  of  the  last 
years  of  the  eighties  had  caused  a  fusion  between  the 
interests  of  the  public  and  private  stages. 

The  reason  for  the  earlier  backwardness  of  the  drama 
of  the  people  is  very  largely  sociological,  an  outgrowth 
of  the  peculiar  status  of  the  actor.  The  relation  of  the 
Tudor  government,  uninfluenced  by  Puritanical  bias, 


YARD    OK   THK    FOUR   SWANS    INN,    BISHOPSGATE 

Illustrating  the  usual  scene  of  popular  dramatic  performances  before  1575 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     4*5 

toward  professional  entertainers  is  well  indicated  by 
the  phraseology  of  a  letter  from  the  Lord  Mayor  of 
London  to  the  Lord  Chancellor,1  in  which  the  writer 
reminds  his  lordship  "that  the  players  of  playes  which 
are  vsed  at  the  Theatre  and  other  such  places  and 
tumblers  and  such  like,  are  a  very  superfluous  sort 
of  men,  and  of  suche  facultie  as  the  lawes  haue  dis- 
alowed."  The  disallowance  of  the  laws  during  the 
earlier  part  of  the  reign  arose,  thus,  not  from  moral 
considerations,  but  from  the  "  superfluousness  "  of  the 
class  of  actors;  i.  e.,  their  lack  of  social  responsibility, 
and  the  difficulty  of  fitting  them  closely  into  that  care- 
ful gradation  of  rank  and  mutual  dependence  which 
Tudor  policy  regarded  as  the  only  safeguard  against 
riot  and  sedition.  It  was  this  feeling  which  prompted 
the  statutes  of  14  and  39  Elizabeth  (1571,  1596),  re- 
quiring "all  Fencers,  Bearewardes,  comon  Players  of 
Enterludes  and  Minstrelles  wandring  abroade "  on 
pain  of  prosecution  as  vagabonds,  to  secure  the  pat- 
ronage of  some  member  of  the  nobility  and  thus  sub- 
ject themselves  to  more  or  less  effectual  control.1 
In  their  legal  consequences  these  laws  were,  indeed,  of 
far  less  importance  than  it  has  been  usual  to  believe 
them.  They  merely  sought  to  universalize  a  connec- 
tion which  had  been  very  frequent  since  before  the  be- 
ginning of  the  Tudor  period,  and  it  is  unreasonable 
to  infer  that  they  entirely  succeeded  in  their  purpose. 
On  the  contrary,  the  very  reenactment  of  the  statute 
in  more  stringent  form  would  rather  indicate,  like  the 

1  Dated  April  12,  1580.  Reprinted  in  "The  Remembrancia," 
J/ alone  Society  "Collections,"  i,  46. 

1  For  the  text  of  these  statutes,  see  W.  C.  Hazlitt,  The  Enylith 
Drama  and  Stage,  1809,  21-48,  87  f. 


426  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

repeated  prohibition  of  plays  by  the'mediseval  church, 
that  the  abuse  continued.  Outside  the  policed  dis- 
tricts of  London,  if  not  within  them,  it  is  probable  that 
unlicensed  actors,  as  well  as  "sturdy  beggars"  and 
vagabonds  of  other  kinds  maintained  among  the 
lower  classes  their  illegal  traffic. 

In  its  bearing  upon  the  history  of  the  stage,  the  atti- 
tude of  the  government  was,  however,  decidedly  im- 
portant. On  the  one  hand,  by  discrediting  all  players 
not  directly  connected  with  the  nobility,  it  necessarily 
limited  the  activities  of  the  boycotted  class  to  crude 
and  surreptitious  performance,  and  so  made  the  evo- 
lution of  a  serious  popular  drama  from  this  source  im- 
possible. On  the  other  hand,  these  laws,  together  with 
the  increasing  opposition  of  the  London  corporation, 
greatly  enhanced  the  value  to  the  privileged  companies 
of  their  relation  to  their  noble  patrons,  and  for  a  very 
considerable  period  caused  them  to  regard  the  satis- 
faction of  popular  audiences  as  a  matter  altogether 
subsidiary  to  their  continuance  in  favor  and  reputa- 
tion before  the  courtly  circle,  for  whose  applause, 
moreover,  they  were  obliged  to  compete  keenly  with 
the  entirely  private  bands  of  amateurs. 

That  the  bond  between  the  patron  and  the  public 
entertainers  under  his  protection  was  throughout 
Elizabeth's  reign,  and  particularly  during  the  first 
thirty  years  of  it,  something  considerably  stronger 
than  the  legal  fiction  which  it  has  been  called  l  is  indi- 
cated by  several  kinds  of  evidence:  for  example,  by 
the  intimate  connection  of  the  various  Lords  Cham- 
berlain with  their  respective  companies; 2  and  by 

1  See  F.  E.  Schelling,  Elizabethan  Drama,  i,  143. 

2  See  E.  K.  Chambers,  "The  Elizabethan  Lords  Chamberlain," 
Idalone  Society  "  Collections,"  i,  31  ff. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA    427 

Leicester's  recommendation  to  the  Earl  of  Shrewsbury, 
Lord  President  of  the  North,  of  his  "servauntes — 
plaiers  of  interludes,"  for  whom  he  requests,  in  June, 
1559,  liberty  of  performing  in  Yorkshire,  "being 
honest  men,  and  suche  as  shall  plaie  none  other  mat- 
ters (I  trust)  but  tollerable  and  convenient,  whereof 
some  of  them  have  bene  herde  here  (i.  e.,  at  West- 
minster) alreadie  before  diverse  of  my  Lordis."  1  A 
like  intimate  relation  is  suggested  by  Leicester's  per- 
sonal accompaniment  of  his  players  to  Germany  in 
1585,  and  by  the  very  frank  and  spirited  letter  written 
by  Leicester's  brother,  the  Earl  of  Warwick  (July  23, 
1582)  to  the  Lord  Mayor  in  behalf  of  his  "servant," 
John  David,  a  professional  master  of  defence,  alleged 
to  have  been  discriminated  against  in  his  purpose  of 
giving  a  public  exhibition  at  the  Bull  in  Bishopsgate.2 
The  earliest  indication  of  a  tendency  on  the  part  of 
the  professional  actors  to  put  the  public  performance 
of  plays  on  a  commercial  basis,  and  thus  to  distinguish 
their  popular  exhibitions  from  the  unorganized  and 
casual  shows  of  the  tumblers,  bearwards,  fencers,  and 
minstrels  with  whom  it  was  usual  to  class  them, 
appears  about  1575  in  the  erection  of  the  first  build- 
ings designed  particularly  for  dramatic  entertainment. 
A  sermon  preached  at  Paul's  Cross  by  one  Thomas 
White,  December  9,  1576,  denounces  the  "  sumptuous 
theatre  houses,  a  continual  monument  of  London's 
prodigality  and  folly,"  and  the  distinctive  names  of 
the  original  playhouses,  The  Theatre  and  The  Curtain, 
are  mentioned  both  by  John  Northbrook  in  his  Trea- 

1  Quoted    by  Collier,   Introduction  to    Northbrook 's  Treatise, 
Shakespeare  Society,  1843,  p.  vii. 
1  Cf.  Rcmembrancia,  55-58. 


428  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tise  against  "Dicing,  Dauncing,  Vaine  playes,  or  En- 
terluds,  with  other  idle  pastimes,"  licensed  in  1577, 
and  in  a  sermon  delivered  by  John  Stockwood  in 
1578.1 

The  construction  of  these  edifices,  built  in  close 
proximity  in  Shoreditch,  just  outside  the  sphere  of 
influence  of  the  hostile  London  Council,  marks  an 
advance  in  the  development  of  the  popular  theatre 
which  is  more  striking  on  the  economic  than  on  the 
architectural  side.  The  lines  followed  by  the  builders 
were  substantially  those  of  the  old  inn-yard,  with  its 
interior  balconies,  unfloored  pavement,  and  open  roof; 
and  only  little  effort  was  made,  so  far  as  we  can  as- 
certain, to  emulate  the  greater  sumptuousness  and 
convenience  of  the  indoor  private  theatre.  Thus, 
the  ancient  tradition  of  outdoor  representation,  the 
arrangements  for  placing  the  various  classes  of  the 
audience,  and  all  the  characteristic  devices  of  stage 
practice,  remained  practically  unaltered.  The  build- 
ing of  the  Theatre  and  Curtain  is  mainly  significant, 
because  it  proves  the  great  growth  in  public  interest 
in  drama,  which  the  literature  of  the  time  everywhere 
attests,  and  because  it  shows  on  the  part  of  the  actors 
a  correspondingly  increased  attention  to  the  popular 
exercise  of  their  profession.  Henceforth,  the  per- 
formance of  plays  before  the  multitude  was  a  business 
prosecuted,  not  carelessly  and  at  hap-hazard,  but  as 
a  permanent  career  and  at  the  expense  of  considerable 
outlay  by  astute  men  of  affairs  like  James  Burbage, 
leader  of  Leicester's  company  and  builder  of  the 

1  See  Collier's  Introduction  to  Northbrook's  Treatise,  and  E.  N. 
S.  Thompson,  Controversy  between  the  Puritans  and  the  Stage,  1903, 
103  f. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     429 

Theatre.  Under  these  conditions,  it  was  not  long 
before  the  profits  incident  to  the  public  staging  of  plays 
became  so  large  as  to  raise  to  notable  affluence  a  great 
number  of  stockholder-actors  like  Shakespeare,  Alleyn, 
and  the  younger  Burbage,  and  even  to  attract  the 
cupidity  of  speculators  originally  unconnected  with 
the  profession.  The  best  instance  of  the  latter  class  is, 
of  course,  the  illiterate  but  shrewd  Philip  Henslowe, 
builder  of  the  third  public  theatre,  the  Rose,1  and  long 
the  most  energetic  rival  of  Shakespeare  in  practical 
matters. 

It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  the  newer  theatres 
entirely  supplanted  the  inn-yard  as  the  scene  of  popu- 
lar dramatic  performance  at  any  time  during  the  life 
of  Elizabeth.  It  was  the  Cross  Keys  Inn  in  Grace- 
church  Street  which  in  1589  harbored  Lord  Strange's 
Men  and  thus  inaugurated  the  career,  as  it  would 
seem,  of  the  greatest  of  all  the  London  companies,  — 
that  of  Shakespeare.2  Such  inns  continued  till  after 
the  accession  of  James  I  to  furnish  the  regular  acting 
place  for  smaller  companies,  and  even  occasionally  to 
accommodate  the  greatest  and  most  flourishing,  when 
such  accidents  as  fire,  plague,  or  civic  opposition  de- 
prived them  of  more  ambitious  stages.  And,  though 
the  regular  theatres  developed  enormously  in  seating 
capacity  and  magnificence  after  1590,  receiving  in 
some  cases  gorgeous  interior  adornment,  it  was  prob- 
ably long  before  they  produced  any  essential  innova- 
tion in  method  or  capability  of  stage  presentation. 
The  practical  superiority  of  Shakespeare's  Globe  over 

1  The  date  at  which  the  Rose  was  first  opened  as  a  theatre  ranges 
between  1587  and  1592.  Cf.  W.  W.  Greg,  Hentlmoet  Diary,  ii,  44. 
»  Ibid.,  72,  73. 


430  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

the  contemporary  inn-yard  we  may  assume  to  have 
been  less  a  matter  of  dramatic  effectiveness  than  of 
size  and  regular  business  control. 

Nor  did  the  rise  of  separate  theatres  succeed  in 
entirely  distinguishing  play-acting  from  the  other 
forms  of  popular  entertainment  with  which  it  had 
formerly  been  associated.  Lord  Strange's  company 
appears  to  have  had  its  humble  origin  in  a  band  of  boy 
tumblers  first  mentioned  as  performing  at  court  in 
1580. 1  The  usual  end  of  declining  theatres  was  em- 
ployment as  the  scene  for  fencing  and  acrobatic  exhi- 
bitions; and  the  prudent  Henslowe  constructed  a 
building,  as  late  as  1613,  which  could  be  used  at  will 
for  bear-baiting  "or  acting,  and  which,  after  having 
seen  the  original  production  of  "Bartholomew  Fair," 
was  soon  given  over  entirely  to  the  more  vulgar  amuse- 
ment.2 

The  details  of  Elizabethan  staging  are  largely  ob- 
scure, and  probably  not  wholly  susceptible  of  explana- 
tion; but  the  main  principles  and  the  general  effects 
produced  are  now  hardly  doubtful.  It  is  likely  that 
the  crudities  and  inconsistencies  of  presentation  have 
been  considerably  over-emphasized.  Certainly,  a  good 
deal  of  progress  in  practical  stagecraft  was  made  dur- 
ing the  last  decades  of  the  century,  and  the  absurd- 
ities ridiculed  by  Sidney  in  1580  cannot  be  safely 
predicated  of  the  theatre  of  1600.  The  stage  itself 
seems  to  have  been  of  generous  size  both  in  the  inn- 
yard  and  in  the  regular  playhouse.  In  Henslowe's 
Fortune  —  perhaps  the  largest  of  the  Elizabethan 
buildings  —  43  feet  by  40,  out  of  a  total  ground  area 

1  Henslowe  s  Diary,  ii,  71. 

•  The  "Hope"  Theatre.  See  Greg,  loc.  tit.,  66-68. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA    431 

of  80  feet  square,  were  set  apart  for  the  stage  and 
"tiring-house."  1 

Three  divisions  of  the  stage  must  be  recognized :  an 
outer  and  an  inner  (or  a  forward  and  rear)  portion, 
which  might  be  separated  by  a  curtain,  and  a  balcony 
raised  above  the  inner  stage.2  The  precise  position  and 
number  of  curtains,  and  the  arrangement  of  the  doors 
leading  from  the  tiring-house  behind  the  stage,  are 
questions  in  dispute,  and  perhaps  differed  in  the  vari- 
ous theatres.  The  main  use  of  the  balcony  was  to  in- 
dicate distance  between  the  speakers.  It  might  repre- 
sent the  walls  of  a  besieged  city,  a  lady's  chamber,  or 
the  scaffolding  of  Barabas's  caldron. 

A  great  deal  of  the  confusion  prevalent  in  regard  to 
the  mise  en  scene  of  Elizabethan  plays  is  probably  due 
to  the  failure  to  discriminate  between  the  practice  of 
the  popular  theatres  and  that  observed  in  private  per- 
formances. In  the  latter  case  the  stage  was  ordinarily  a 
temporary  platform  erected  at  the  end  of  the  hall  used 
for  the  presentation,  and  necessarily  removed,  of 
course  when  the  hall  was  restored  to  its  normal  func- 
tion.3 Thus,  till  the  influence  of  popular  procedure 

1  On  the  shape  of  the  Elizabethan  stage,  see  my  article  in  the 
New  York  Nation,  Dec.,  1910. 

1  Probably  the  best  discussion  of  Elizabethan  staging  is  con- 
tained in  V.  E.  Albright's  Shaksperian  Stage,  1909,  which  supplies 
also  a  criticism  of  the  rival  dissertations  of  C.  Brodmeier  (1904); 
G.  F.  Reynolds,  1905;  and  R.  Wegener,  1907.  A  general  survey  of 
the  subject  and  an  excellent  bibliography  will  be  found  in  the  Cam- 
bridge History  of  Eng.  Lit.,  vi,  ch.  x. 

1  In  illustration  of  the  flimsy  nature  of  the  stage  architecture  in 
private  performances,  see  the  account  of  the  fatal  accident  which 
occurred  when  Edwards's  lost  Palemon  and  Arcite  was  acted  before 
Queen  Elizabeth  in  Christ  Church  hall,  Oxford  (1566).  Nicholla, 
Progresses  of  Elizabeth,  18*3,  210-213. 


482  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

and  the  growing  tendency  to  prodigality  in  indbon 
theatricals  began  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  extrava- 
gance of  Inigo  Jones  and  the  other  great  Stuart  archi- 
tects of  the  private  stage,  the  court  and  college  dramas 
seem  to  have  been  produced  upon  a  slight  elevated 
flooring  concealed  by  a  single  curtain  or  by  none.  We 
find,  therefore,  that  the  interludes,  the  early  imitations 
of  Latin  drama,  and  the  court  comedies  of  Lyly  —  all 
intended  for  indoor  performance  —  either  make  no 
effort  at  visualizing  scene,  or  adhere  to  the  constant 
Roman  practice  of  a  street  before  several  houses, 
or  else  resort  to  such  childish  devices  for  indicating 
change  of  place  as  the  pushing  of  Diogenes 's  tub  on 
and  off  the  stage  in  full  view  of  the  spectators. 

These  imperfections  of  the  private  theatre  should 
not  be  permitted  to  obscure  one's  realization  that,  by 
the  last  decade  of  the  century,  the  public  stage  had 
comparatively  satisfactory  means  of  suggesting  change 
of  locality,  and  even  of  creating  dramatic  illusion,  in 
the  permanent  threefold  division  mentioned  above. 
An  invariable  practice  cannot  safely  be  assumed,  but  it. 
is  highly  probable  that  verisimilitude  was  obtained  to 
a  large  degree  by  a  somewhat  regular  alternation  be- 
tween scenes  acted  on  the  outer  portion  only  of  the 
lower  stage  and  scenes  in  which  the  inner  portion  also 
was  exposed.  The  balcony  above  could  be  separately 
screened  when  not  required,  and  it  might  be  used  in 
connection  with  either  the  outer  or  the  entire  lower 
stage.  The  inner  stage  seems  often  to  have  been 
rather  elaborately  decorated  and  to  have  contained 
a  considerable  amount  of  furniture.  The  outer  divi- 
sion, on  the  other  hand,  we  may  imagine  to  have  been 
totally,  or  almost  totally,  bare,  and  it  was  probably 


'  ~ '  ~  •  • 

^1 


TITLK-PAGE   OF   N.    RICHARDS'8 
"TRAGEDY  OF  MKSSALLINA,"  1C40 

Acted  by  the  Company  of  hU  Majesty's  Revels. 
With  sketch  of  stage  and  actors 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     433 

used  for  indefinitely  located  scenes  requiring  space  for. 
relatively  few  actors.  All  Elizabethan  dramas  abound 
in  brief  scenes  of  monologue  or  casual  conversation,  in, 
which  the  chorus,  hero  or  villain,  a  couple  of  court 
gentlemen,  or  a  knot  of  clowns  occupy  the  attention  of, 
the  audience  in  the  intervals  between  weightier  scenes 
involving  a  great  number  of  figures  and  demanding 
clear  localization.  In  many  of  these  cases,  it  is  hard  to  - 
avoid  the  conclusion  that  the  slighter  passage  was 
particularly  devised  for  the  purpose  of  beguiling  the 
time,  while  behind  the  drawn  intermediate  curtain, 
the  rear  stage  was  being  decorated.1  By  some  such 
method  as  this,  we  may  be  sure,  changes  of  place  were 
marked  without  that  tedious  period  of  blank  expect- 
ancy between  the  scenes  which  no  Elizabethan  audi- 
ence would  ever  have  endured,  and  which  becomes 
possible  even  in  the  modern  theatre  only  when  the 
number  of  changes  is  greatly  reduced. 

It  is  certain  that  the  Elizabethan  popular  theatre 
made  use  of  numerous  stage  properties  and  attempted, 
according  to  its  standards,  a  considerably  more  real- 
istic imitation  of  life  than  seems  often  to  be  imagined. 
Frank  anachronism,  of  course,  must  be  conceded,  both 
in  the  dress  of  the  actors  and  in  scenic  decoration. 
Apart,  however,  from  this  failure  to  distinguish  be- 
tween the  fashions  of  the  ages,  the  dramatists  and 
managers  were  undoubtedly  fully  aware  of  the  pic- 
torial limitations  of  their  staging,  and  eager  to  heighten 
t  lu>  illusion  of  the  spectators.  Though  the  bulk  of  the 
expense  of  setting  out  a  play  went  in  purchase  of  cos- 

1  Cf.  The  Puritan,  III,  iii,  iv.  See  also  A.  H.  Tolman.  "Alter- 
nation in  the  Staging  of  Shakespeare's  Plays,"  Mod.  Phil.,  vi  (1009), 
617  ff. 


434  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

tumes  for  the  performers,  Henslowe's  lists  of  expendi- 
tures are  in  themselves  sufficient  evidence  of  the  atten- 
tion paid  to  scenic  furnishings;  and  everything  we 
know  of  the  procedure  of  the  day  emphasizes  the  fal- 
lacy of  assuming  for  the  theatre  of  Shakespeare's  time 
a  smaller  regard  for  pictorial  effect  than  can  be  clearly 
proved  for  the  performances  of  the  mystery  cycles  two 
centuries  before.  Practicable  furniture  of  many  kinds 
—  trees  that  could  be  climbed  or  lopped  off,  hedges  and 
arrases  that  would  really  conceal  —  did  undoubtedly 
exist,  and  could  certainly  be  replaced  by  other  fittings 
when  change  of  scene  rendered  them  glaringly  out  of 
keeping. 

Of  scenery  in  the  modern  sense  there  can  hardly  be 
a  question;  but  painted  cloths  may  have  been  used 
somewhat  ambitiously  to  suggest  buildings,  or  even 
landscape,  —  particularly  perhaps  in  connection  with 
the  upper  balcony  stage.  The  boards  hung  up  to  pro- 
claim the  scene  of  action,  and  occasionally  the  title 
of  the  play  as  well,  were  merely  the  equivalent  of  the 
modern  theatre  programme,  and  cannot  be  regarded 
as  in  any  sense  a  substitute  or  alternative  for  visual 
scenery. 

Altogether,  the  numerous  plays  printed  directly 
from  the  prompter's  copies  used  in  the  theatres,  and 
such  documents  as  "Henslowe's  Diary"  and  the  re- 
cords of  eye-witnesses  of  performances  bear  out  inher- 
ent probability  in  showing  the  stage  of  1600  to  have 
been  unusually  plastic  and  inventive  in  its  solution 
of  the  external  problems  of  presentation,  and  not  indif- 
ferent —  as  it  has  sometimes  been  held  —  but  sensitive 
in  the  highest  degree  to  the  real  capabilities  of  stage 
business  and  scenic  effect. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     435 

The  external  development  of  the  Elizabethan  the- 
atre, with  which  we  have  just  been  concerned,  was 
influenced  at  several  points  by  the  course  of  critical 
opinion  regarding  the  drama.  We  have  seen  how  the 
governmental  regulation  of  player  companies,  by 
checking  the  free  evolution  of  a  vulgar  democratic 
stage,  kept  the  popular  drama  for  a  time  in  subjection 
to  the  interests  of  private  aristocratic  performance, 
but  ended  by  enriching  the  former  with  the  heritage  of 
experiment  and  innovation  which  the  learned  writers, 
for  the  private  stage  had  accumulated.  Thus  the  pub- 
lic theatre  of  1590  acquired  a  breadth  of  scope  and  a 
universal  adaptability  impossible  to  a  purely  indige- 
nous plebeian  growth.  In  addition  to  this  influence  of 
practical  policy,  two  great  waves  of  formal  contro- 
versy, which  came  to  a  head  during  the  reign  of  Eliza- 
beth, left  their  mark  upon  the  drama  as  upon  other 
species  of  literature. 

The  first  of  these  forces  was  the  all-embracing  tide 
of  Puritan  philosophy,  which,  beginning  in  a  more  or 
less  academic  and  impartial  query  concerning  the 
justification  of  ornamental  art  in  general,  directed  its 
arraignment  not  only  against  the  stage,  but  against 
practically  all  poetry  and  fiction,  music,  and  dancing. 
This  attitude  of  mind,  voiced  in  its  mildest  aspect  by 
Ascham,  repeats  itself  in  slightly  more  specialized  form 
in  the  works  of  Northbrook  and  Gosson,  —  the  earli- 
est important  antagonists  of  the  theatre,  —  and  finds 
a  response  equally  catholic  and  far-reaching  in  Sid- 
ney's noble  "Apologie  for  Poetrie."  However,  in  the 
heat  of  the  quarrel  thus  punctiliously  opened,  atten- 
tion concentrated  itself  more  and  more  upon  the  most 
concrete  object  of  dispute:  the  contemporary  stage. 


436  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

The  growing  force  of  anti-dramatic  prejudice,  strong 
enough  from  the  start  to  prevent  the  erection  of  the- 
atres within  the  limits  of  London  municipal  control 
and  very  seriously  to  hamper  even  irregular  inn-yard 
performances  in  the  same  district,  succeeded  during 
the  Stuart  period  in  depriving  the  drama  first  of  its 
chief  right  to  live,  and  then,  for  a  space,  of  all  open 
existence.1 

The  other  great  critical  dispute,  only  less  universal 
in  its  issues  than  that  occasioned  by  the  rise  of  the 
Puritan  attitude,  likewise  affected  the  drama  at  first 
merely  as  one  of  the  branches  of  creative  poetry.  This 
controversy,  taking  its  origin  from  the  Renaissance,  as 
the  other  arose  from  the  Reformation,  sought  a  final 
permanent  settlement  for  all  questions  of  literary 
standard  and  artistic  form.  The  proposition  debated 
was  in  effect  this :  Granted  once  that  imaginative  litera- 
ture had  a  moral  claim  to  existence,  should  it  find  its 
expression  in  the  ever  changing  patterns  evolved  from 
time  to  time  by  contemporary  taste,  or  could  it  dis- 
cover in  classic  usage  stylistic  and  structural  models  of 
universal  application  ?  In  a  conflict  waged  thus  over 
the  whole  field  of  poetic  practice,  it  is  hardly  surpris- 
ing that  the  opposing  lines  became  sometimes  curi- 
ously confused.  Thus,  Spenser  and  Campion  —  two 
of  the  most  graceful  expositors  of  the  romantic  capa- 
bilities of  English  verse,  and  both  special  masters  of 
rhythmic  effect  —  became  conspicuous  assailants  of 
the  "  barbarousness "  of  rime,  and  defenders  of  the 
ungainly  and  rasping  imitations  of  classic  metre.  On 

1  It  should  be  remembered,  however,  that  surreptitious  dramatic 
performances  were  never  absolutely  abolished  during  the  era  of 
Puritan  control. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA     487 

the  other  side,  Daniel,  the  most  distinguished  stickler 
for  classic  regularity  in  the  drama,  delivered  the  final 
decisive  blow  in  defence  of  the  general  romantic  con- 
tention in  his  eloquent  and  unanswerable  "Defence 
of  Rime." 

As  far  as  the  theatre  was  concerned,  this  dispute 
tended  to  resolve  itself  into  an  opposition,  probably 
not  clearly  recognized  at  first,  between  the  private 
stage,  strongly  inclined  to  classic  uniformity  and  regu- 
larity, and  the  popular  drama,  which  grew  increasingly 
romantic  and  irregular  as  it  grew  more  independent. 
The  issue  of  the  controversy  can  be  traced  through 
the  previous  chapters  in  the  gradual  decline  of  the 
drama  of  Latin  imitation  and  the  development  of  the 
various  national,  "romantic"  types.  The  period  at 
which  the  result  was  decided  appears  from  the  fact 
that  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  writing  his  "Apology  for 
Poetry  "  about  1580,  pronounces  strongly  —  and  con- 
sidering the  state  of  the  English  theatre  at  the  time, 
undoubtedly  justly  —  in  favor  of  plays  built  on  classic 
lines.  Ten  years  later,  however,  the  romantic  popular 
type  had  so  completely  outstripped  competition  that 
adherence  to  classic  rule  continues  to  show  itself  only 
in  dramatic  freaks  and  "sports,"  like  the  effusions  of 
the  Countess  of  Pembroke's  school,  or  in  unsuccessful 
efforts  at  compromise  between  the  two  methods  such  as 
Jonson's  Roman  tragedies. 

Thus  the  purely  literary  controversy  between  classi- 
cism and  romanticism  settled  itself  within  the  limits  of 
time  to  which  our  study  has  been  restricted  with  as 
much  finality  as  such  critical  uncertainties  can  ever 
reach.  The  other  broader  issue,  involved  in  the  Puri- 
tan hostility  to  the  stage,  was  protracted  far  into  the 


438  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

Stuart  period,  and  any  proper  understanding  of  its 
vital  consequences  requires  a  careful  review  of  the 
general  progress  of  pre-Restoration  drama  in  England. 
Such  a  review  will  perhaps  make  clear  also  the  essential 
nature  of  the  Elizabethan  drama  and  the  fundamental 
differences  which  distinguish  it  from  that  of  the  suc- 
ceeding age. 

The  late  Mr.  J.  A.  Symonds  has  written  a  well- 
known  essay l  "On  the  Drama  of  Elizabeth  and  James 
considered  as  the  main  product  of  the  Renaissance  in 
England."  The  dependence  of  the  Elizabethan  drama 
on  the  Renaissance  is,  of  course,  a  commonplace  every- 
where acknowledged  and  so  oft  reiterated  that  it  has 
almost  ceased  to  appear  a  commonplace,  and  has  come 
to  be  accepted  as  an  article  of  unreasoning  faith.  To 
recognize  the  connection,  however,  is  to  do  little  more 
than  admit  that  a  great  imaginative  upheaval  has 
produced  great  imaginative  results.  We  are  little 
nearer  than  before  to  the  answer  to  the  question  of 
real  importance;  namely,  just  what  these  results  were, 
and  exactly  in  what  manner  they  were  displayed. 

That  strange  literary  product,  the  drama  of  the 
Tudor  and  Jacobean  age,  can  best  be  likened,  perhaps, 
by  a  rather  homely  comparison,  to  the  seed-pod  of 
some  leguminous  plant.  Starting  from  the  slender 
promise  of  the  stem,  it  grows  with  a  fecundity  be- 
yond explanation,  through  imperfect  or  stunted  pro- 
ducts to  the  large  girth  and  richness  of  the  centre. 
Then,  as  if  the  life-giving  power  were  gradually  with- 
drawn, it  becomes  ever  narrower  and  more  restricted, 
till  it  ends  in  sheer  abortion.  Those  who  attempt  the 

1  Printed  as  General  Introduction  to  the  Mermaid  edition  of 
Marlowe. 


study  of  such  an  organism  from  a  cross  section  through 
the  middle  —  as  is  commonly  the  method  in  litera- 
ture —  are  confounded  by  the  number,  the  variety, 
and  the  mutual  unlikeness  of  the  cells.  It  is  better 
that  one  endeavor  first  to  discover  the  few  genital  ele- 
ments whose  presence  creates  all  the  diverse  mani- 
festations of  maturity,  and  whose  absence  transforms 
maturity  into  decay. 

That  some  such  causes  exist  for  the  brilliant  bloom 
of  Elizabethan  drama  and  its  subsequent  degenera- 
tion admits  of  no  doubt.  The  accident  of  individual 
genius  by  no  means  accounts  sufficiently  for  the  phe- 
nomena. But  we  shall  probably  never  be  able  to  lay 
these  causes  completely  bare,  and  to  estimate  the  pre- 
cise importance  of  each.  There  appear,  however,  two 
considerations,  which,  if  they  did  not  completely  con- 
trol the  progress  of  pre-Restoration  drama,  are  at 
least  closely  correlated  with  its  rise,  flourishing,  and 
decline.  They  are:  first,  the  relation  of  the  drama  at 
different  stages  to  religious  feeling;  and,  second,  its 
relation  to  the  personal  life  and  the  political  views  of 
its  age. 

From  the  time  of  the  English  Renaissance — about 
the  time,  let  us  say,  of  Skelton's  "Magnificence"  — 
to  the  period  of  Elizabeth's  accession,  the  drama  had 
been  gradually  working  itself  away  from  the  religious 
tendencies  of  medievalism  and  in  the  direction  of 
vulgar  comedy.  The  movement  was  quite  natural, 
and  its  first  beginnings  long  antedate  the  period  I  have 
mentioned.  It  was  not  carried  out,  however,  entirely 
without  a  check,  because  the  English  Reformation 
and  the  theological  disputes  it  engendered  gave  to 
religion  for  a  time  a  particular  dramatic  interest.  Thus, 


440  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

we  find  a  kind  of  recrudescence  of  the  clerical  element 
in  the  work  of  the  Protestant  zealot,  Bishop  Bale,  and 
the  authors  of  "New  Custom"  and  "King  Darius," 
and  in  the  strongly  anti-reformatory  play  of  "Respub- 
lica."  These  controversial  pieces,  however,  stand  by 
themselves,  and  perhaps  had  but  little  influence  on 
general  taste  and  procedure.  By  the  time  the  real 
Elizabethan  drama  was  inaugurated  in  the  earliest 
works  of  Peele,  Kyd,  and  Marlowe,  the  stage  had  com- 
pletely enfranchised  itself  from  definitely  ecclesiastical 
tendencies. 

In  general,  the  drama  would  appear  to  have  main- 
tained a  position  of  neutrality  on  the  subject  of  reli- 
gion, though  certainly  not  without  occasional  lapses 
into  polemics,  from  about  1585  till  the  death  of 
Elizabeth.  The  greatest  and  sanest  work  of  this  period 
stands  free,  as  it  ought  to  do,  both  of  religious  coloring 
and  of  theological  dispute.  But  already  a  strong  reflex 
movement  had  begun.  No  sooner  had  the  theatre 
emancipated  itself  from  vassalage  to  the  ancient 
church  than  it  was  threatened  with  total  annihilation 
by  the  newborn  forces  of  Puritanism.  The  Puritan 
attack  had  begun,  as  has  been  seen,  very  early  in  Eliza- 
beth's reign,  and  it  manifested  itself  in  at  least  two 
ways:  in  constant  opposition  to  theatres  and  things 
theatrical  on  the  part  of  the  representatives  of  middle- 
class  respectability;  and  in  formal  public  denuncia- 
tions like  Northbrook's  Treatise  and  Stephen  Gos- 
son's  "School  of  Abuse,"  published  as  early  as  1577 
and  1579  respectively.  Of  such  pamphlets  there  was 
indeed  no  end;  they  increased  in  virulence  and  in 
number  as  the  century  declined  and  the  next  century 
began.  Among  the  host  may  be  mentioned  Thomas 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA    441 

Beard's  "Theatre  of  God's  Judgments,"  1598,  which 
after  passing  through  several  editions,  was  recast  by 
another  hand  and  brought  out  under  a  title  savoring  no 
less  than  the  first  of  sulphur  and  brimstone,  "The 
Theatre  of  God's  Judgments"  being  heightened  into 
"The  Thunderbolt  of  God's  Wrath."  Another  ex- 
pression of  the  same  attitude  is  William  Vaughan's 
"Golden  Grove,"  first  printed  in  1600  and  reedited  in 
1608.  The  sixty-sixth  chapter  of  the  second  edition 
of  this  work  proposes  the  question,  "Whether  Stage 
playes  ought  to  be  suffred  in  a  Common-wealth,"  and 
proceeds  to  answer  it  most  emphatically  in  the  nega- 
tive. 

For  a  time,  as  we  have  said,  the  greater  Elizabethan 
dramatists  held  their  course,  unaffected  by  the  Puri- 
tan onslaughts;  but  this  could  not  long  continue  to  be 
the  case.  Players  and  playwrights,  having  had  the 
position  of  pariahs  forced  upon  them,  gradually  ac- 
commodated their  lives  and  writings  to  the  character. 
Offences  originally  casual  became  conscious  and  dis- 
proportioned.  What  had  been  no  more  than  the 
necessary  dark  shading  in  the  picture  of  actual  life 
was  dwelt  upon  till  the  whole  effect  grew  morbid  and 
ugly.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  blame  for  this 
rests  rather  with  Puritanism  than  with  the  drama. 
It  was  quite  impossible  for  the  latter  long  to  ignore  the 
hue  and  cry  that  was  raised  against  it,  and  submission 
to  Puritan  dictation  meant  nothing  short  of  absolute 
extinction.  There  was  no  choice  but  avowed  hostility. 
The  gauntlet  so  often  thrown  down  by  the  opposite 
party  must  at  length  be  taken  up,  though  by  that  act 
the  drama  sealed  its  doom.  Henceforth,  its  two  chief 
elements  of  greatness  were  vanished.  From  being  the 


442  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

voice  of  a  great  nation  undivided,  it  must  descend  to 
the  place  of  mouthpiece  to  a  particular  faction;  and 
with  its  representative  character  it  lost  also  its  im- 
partiality of  vision.  It  could  no  longer  depict  life  as 
life  really  was:  the  poison  spot  of  anti-Puritan  bitter- 
ness soon  spread  so  as  to  infect  the  whole  body  and 
sour  its  whole  judgment  of  men  and  manners. 

The  year  in  which  Elizabeth  died  —  1603  —  is  in  a 
number  of  ways  a  convenient  landmark  in  the  progress 
of  dramatic  history.  It  is  about  this  time  that  the 
drama  begins  to  grow  conscious  of  the  break  with  the 
forces  of  religion  and  morality.  Already  in  Shake- 
speare's later  work  there  are  uneasy  allusions  to 
Brownists  and  Precisians.  In  plays  like  "Eastward 
Hoe"  (1605),  "The  Puritan"  (1607),  and  "Bartholo- 
mew Fair"  (1614),  the  antagonism  is  acknowledged, 
but  it  is  not  yet  too  bitter  to  furnish  matter  for  jest. 
Ridicule,  however,  even  in  the  skilful  hands  of  Ben 
Jonson  and  Marston,  collapsed  like  a  wall  of  sand 
before  the  advancing  tide  of  Puritanism.  The  genera- 
tion which  began  with  the  production  of  "Measure  for 
Measure"  and  "Eastward  Hoe"  saw  the  drama  slowly 
driven  from  its  position.  Little  by  little,  the  ground 
of  sober  reason  and  reality  crumbled  under  its  feet, 
till  it  slipped  almost  unawares  into  the  bog  of  motive- 
less ribaldry.  During  the  last  phase  —  to  speak 
roughly,  during  the  Caroline  epoch  —  English  drama 
is  no  longer  what  it  had  successively  been,  either  the 
coadjutor,  or  the  compeer,  or  the  jealous  rival,  or  the 
desperate  assailant  of  Religion.  It  has  forfeited  all 
claim  to  consideration  as  a  moral  and  ethical  force, 
has  accepted  the  brand  of  vagabondage,  and  is  con- 
tent to  make  its  appeal  to  moral  outcasts. 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA    443 

It  was  for  this  reason  that  Stuart  drama  faded  and 
decayed,  rather  than  from  any  of  the  more  usual 
causes  of  literary  decline.  The  interesting  and  on  many 
accounts  marvellously  attractive  work  of  that  period 
—  the  work  of  Fletcher  and  Middleton,  Massinger 
and  Shirley  —  displays  assuredly  no  lack  of  imagina- 
tive brilliance  or  poetic  beauty.  In  richness  of  color- 
ing and  skill  of  plot  construction  it  rivals  the  highest 
achievement  of  the  true  Elizabethans.  The  form  is 
there  in  almost  undiminished  splendor;  it  is  the 
healthy  spirit,  the  sane  and  comprehensive  grasp  of 
life,  which  is  missing.  Something  of  this  sort  is  what 
Professor  Dowden  means  by  the  following  paragraph 
from  his  book,  "Puritan  and  Anglican": l  — 

"The  chief  glory  of  Elizabethan  literature  was  the 
drama,  with  the  deepest  passion  and  the  most  heroic 
actions  of  humanity  for  its  theme.  It  had  its  basis  in 
what  is  most  real  in  the  life  of  man,  and  what  is  real 
was  interpreted  into  the  highest  meanings  by  imagina- 
tion. During  the  latter  years  of  the  reign  of  James  I 
and  during  the  reign  of  Charles  the  drama  lost  touch 
with  reality;  it  was  cut  off  from  its  true  basis  of  supply. 
It  advanced  with  a  showy  gallantry,  but  its  strength 
and  solidity  of  movement  were  gone.  It  relied  too 
often,  as  with  Massinger  and  Fletcher,  on  overstrained, 
fantastic  motives.  It  deserted  the  substantial  ground 
of  national  history.  It  endeavoured  to  excite  a  jaded 
imagination  with  extravagances  of  romantic  passion 
or  even  of  unnatural  lust.  It  sought  for  curiosities  of 
prettiness  in  sentiment  and  imagery.  It  supported  its 
decline  by  splendors  appealing  to  the  senses;  vast  sums 

'  Pages  2,  3. 


444  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

of  money  were  expended  upon  the  masque.  It  grew 
shallow  in  true  passion  and  meditative  wisdom.  It  grew 
rhetorical;  its  moralities  are  often  those  of  eloquent 
periods.  And  if  at  times  less  rudely  gross  than  the 
earlier  drama,  it  was  infected  with  a:  subtler  and  a 
baser  spirit  of  evil." 

The  words  quoted,  like  much  of  what  has  just  been 
said  in  discussing  the  attitude  of  the  drama  toward 
moral  tendencies,  have  an  application  which  extends 
far  beyond  the  limits  of  religion  or  of  ethics.  During 
the  age  of  which  we  are  treating,  dramatic  literature 
and  established  religion  were  infinitely  more  than  the 
narrowly  defined  and  essentially  unrelated  phenomena 
they  are  at  present.  Each  had  potentially,  at  least,  if 
not  in  actuality,  a  scope  so  enormous  as  to  include 
within  itself  the  entire  social,  political,  and  intellectual 
import  of  the  national  life:  and  that  would  probably 
be  no  very  distorted  conception  of  history  which 
should  regard  the  Elizabethan  impulse  toward  dra- 
matic self-expression  and  the  great  Puritan  movement 
as  the  protagonists  in  a  struggle,  where  the  prize  of 
victory  was  nothing  less  than  the  power  of  shaping 
the  ideals  and  interests  of  the  English  people. 

The  discussion,  therefore,  of  the  gradual  overthrow 
of  the  Elizabethan  drama  as  an  ethical  force  links 
itself  naturally  with  what  I  have  referred  to  as  the 
second  great  cause  of  the  drama's  decline:  its  gradual 
divorce  from  the  serious  concerns  of  contemporary 
life.  The  gain  of  Puritanism  was  here  also  the  loss  of 
the  drama;  and  the  latter  was  deprived  of  its  very 
blood  and  brawn  when  the  spirit  of  the  age  came  to  be 
expressed  no  longer  through  it,  but  through  the  lit- 
erary work  of  Donne,  Herbert,  Vaughan,  and  Milton, 


THE  NATURE  OF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA    445 

and  the  political  personalities  of  Hampden,  Selden, 
and  Cromwell. 

During  the  interval  between  1603  and  1642  the 
drama  underwent  a  sort  of  desiccation;  it  lost  its  sap 
and  freshness.  The  milk  of  human  kindness  and 
catholic  sympathy,  which  keeps  the  work  of  Eliza- 
beth's reign  sweet  in  spite  of  all  its  outspoken  coarse- 
ness, was  soured  first  into  cynicism  and  at  length  com- 
pletely evaporated,  leaving  nothing  behind  but  a 
dried  and  hollow  shell.  The  first  stage  of  the  change  is 
found  in  the  plays  of  Webster,  Tourneur,  and  Ford. 
Here  is  as  yet  no  coldness  or  lack  of  vitality,  surely; 
but  the  warmth  is  that  of  fever  rather  than  health. 
The  connection  with  genuine  English  life  and  feeling 
has  been  broken,  once  for  all.  Neither  in  the  individual 
characters  nor  in  the  general  spirit  which  informs  such 
plays  as  "Vittoria  Corombona,"  "The  Revenger's 
Tragedy,"  and  "The  Broken  Heart,"  is  there  much 
suggestion  of  the  real  seventeenth-century  England. 
Throughout,  one  finds  the  stale  and  acrid  flavor  of 
decadent  Italianism,  consciously  imported  and  mor- 
bidly emphasized.  In  its  general  tendencies,  indeed, 
and  in  its  fundamental  character,  this  school  of  drama 
is  no  longer  English;  it  is  "Italianate"  in  the  full  de- 
rogatory sense  in  which  Roger  Ascham  employs  the 
term,1  and  to  a  much  more  harmful  degree  than  any 
literary  force  of  Ascham's  day  could  possibly  have 
been. 

The  fierce  flame  of  unnatural  passion  which  lends 
heat  and  brilliance  to  the  plays  of  Webster  and  Ford 
was  necessarily  short-lived:  it  was  but  the  last  wild 

1  See  The  Scholemaster,  ed.  Arber,  English  Reprints,  1870,  77- 
81. 


446  THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

guttering  that  preceded  extinction,  and  it  consumed 
in  its  sudden  blaze  the  final  remnants  of  dramatic  fuel. 
By  its  ignoring  of  the  ordinary  human  interests,  Ja- 
cobean tragedy  had  already  squandered  the  principal 
resource  upon  which  its  continuance  depended.  After 
Ford,  there  was  no  psychological  abnormity,  no  im- 
aginable depth  of  misery  or  excess  of  half -crazed  pas- 
sion, which  could  stimulate  any  longer  dramatic  atten- 
tion. We  have  the  inevitable  result  in  much  of  the 
work  of  Glapthorne  and  Shirley.  The  drama  is  but  a 
polished  crust,  void  of  psychical  interest  and  philo- 
sophic import.  It  has  but  two  dimensions:  there  is 
no  depth  to  it.  If  we  attempt  to  probe  the  hearts  of  the 
characters,  to  search  beneath  the  cut  and  thrust  of  the 
dialogue  and  the  orderly  procession  of  incident  for 
the  organic  life  that  inspires  the  whole,  we  find  little 
but  dead  dust  and  putrefaction. 

The  main  cause,  therefore,  why  the  English  drama 
of  the  reigns  of  James  I  and  Charles  I  steadily  de- 
clined, and  finally  came  near  to  death,  is  not  to  be  dis- 
covered in  the  hostility  of  the  law-makers  or  the  dis- 
turbances of  civil  war,  though  these  forces,  naturally, 
contributed  in  some  measure.  The  main  reason  is  the 
fact  that  the  Stuart  drama  came  by  successive  stages, 
the  first  of  which  dates  from  very  early  in  the  reign  of 
James,  to  represent  almost  the  complete  negation  of 
those  qualities  of  nationalism  and  responsiveness  to 
the  waves  of  popular  feeling,  which  gave  the  drama  of 
Elizabeth  its  exuberant  vigor  and  its  wonderful  com- 
plexity. 


INDEX 


INDEX 


(Individual  plays  are  entered  separately  according  to  their  titles,  rather 
than  under  the  names  of  authors.  Wherever  the  authorship  is  deter- 
mined, the  writer's  name  follows  the  title  of  the  play.  Numerals  printed  in 
italic  refer  to  bibliographical  sections  of  the  book;  those  printed  in  full- 
faced  type  indicate  formal  discussions  of  the  subject  indexed.) 


"ABRAHAM'S  SACRIFICE,"  play  of,  in 
Brome  MS.  See  "  Brome  " ;  in  Dub- 
lin MS.  See  "Dublin";  translated 
from  French  by  A.  Golding,  133, 
144- 

"Acolastus,"  124,  note. 

Adams,  J.  Q.,  96,  note;  102,  £94,  417. 

JSIian,  173. 

jEschylus,  326. 

"^Ethiopica"  (.-Ethiopian  History), 
by  Heliodorus,  259  /.,  261. 

"Alaham"  (Fulke  Greville).  201,  ££6. 

"Albion  Knight,"  109,  143. 

Albright,  V.  E.,  33,  note;  431,  note  2. 

"  Albumazar"  (T.  Tomkia),  169. 

"Alchemist,  The"  (Ben.  Jonson), 
152,  169,  184,  402,  418  f. 

Alexander,  Sir  William,  Earl  of  Stir- 
ling, 201,  202,  226. 

"Alexandrsean.  The"  (Sir  William 
Alexander),  201. 

Alleyn,  E.,  58,  429. 

"All  Fools"  (G.  Chapman).  154,  187, 
402,  404  /.,  416. 

"All  for  Money"  (T.  Lupton),  111, 
117-119,  141,  ;  43. 

"All's  Well  that  Ends  Well"  (Shake- 
speare), 243,  note;  281  /. 

"  Alphonsus  of  Arragon"  (R.  Greene), 
246,  £55,  265. 

"  Alphonsus  of  Germany,"  212,  219  /., 
228. 

Alsfeld,  passion  play  of,  18. 

"  Amadis  of  Gaul,"  233,  234,  243. 

"Ameto"  (G.  Boccaccio),  260. 

"Aminta"  (T.  Tasso),  289 /.,  £95. 

"Amphitruo"  (Plautus),  relation  of, 
to  "  Jack  Juggler,"  157 /.;  relation  of, 
to  "Tho  Birth  of  Hercules."  160. 

Amyot,  Jacques,  260. 

"Andria"  (Terence),  168,  I8t. 

"Antonio  and  Mellida,"  two  parts  (J. 
Marston),  220,  288,  380. 


"Antonius"  (Countess  of  Pembroke, 
from  Garnier),  198  /.,  200,  ££5. 

"Antony  and  Cleopatra"  (Shake- 
speare), 330.  336  /.,  348. 

"Appius  and  Virginia"  (R.  B.),  58, 
120,  note;  138,  140.  146,  205,  206. 

Arber.  Edward,  386. 

"Arcadia"  (Sannazzaro),  260. 

"Arcadia"  (Sir  P.  Sidney),  256.  260. 
262,  280,  288. 

"Arden  of  Feversham,"  352,  354, 
355-357,  359-361,  368,  S87. 

Ariosto,  L.    See  "Suppositi." 

Armada,  The,  175,  345. 

"Arraignment  of  Paris,  The"  (Q. 
Peele),  180,  187,  265,  290,  423. 

Arthur.   See  "King  Arthur." 

Ascension  Day,  dramatic  services  on, 
3. 

Ascham,  Roger,  37. 164, 233,  435,  445. 

"As  You  Like  It"  (Shakespeare), 
152,  179,  256,  263,  269,  270,  274, 
279,  280,  283,  284,  287,  288.  £95. 

"Aulularia"  (Plautus),  404. 

Autolycus,  108,  396  /. 

Bacon,  Francis,  194. 

Bale,  John,  74,  note;  85,  89-68,  91, 

100,  112;  German  connections,  130; 

149.  440. 
Ballad,  The,  230,  231.   See  also  "  Rox- 

burghe." 

Bandello.  M.,  257. 
Bariona,    L.    (Lawrence     Johnson?), 

165,  168. 
"Barnavelt,    Sir   John    van   Olden," 

(J.  Fletcher?),  345,  note;  S49. 
Barnes,  Barnabe.  See  "  Devil's  Char- 
ter." 
"  Bartholomew  Fair"  (B.  Jonson),  79, 

367,  402,  407,  419,  430,  442 
BMkervill,  C.    R.,  411.    note;    41&, 

4*0. 


450 


INDEX 


"Battle  of  Alcazar,  The"  (G.  Peele), 

304,  310,  311  /.,  348. 
Beard,  Thomas,  441. 
Beatty,  Arthur,  4,  note;  41. 
Beccari,  A.,  289. 
"Beech's  Tragedy,"  362. 
Berners,  Lord,  translator.  See  "  Huon 

of  Bordeaux"  and  "Froissart." 
Beverley   (in  Yorkshire),   lost   plays 

acted  at,  7,  12,  49. 
Beza,  Theodore,  133,  1 44. 
"Biron,"  two  parts  (G.  Chapman), 

250,  322,  349. 
"Birth  of  Hercules,  The"   (adapted 

from  the  "  Amphitruo"  of  Plautus), 

160,  184. 
"Birth  of  Merlin,  The,"   191,  note; 

340,  360. 
"Black  Bateman  of  the  North"  (lost 

play),  353. 
"Black  Dog  of  Newgate,  The"  (lost 

play),  353,  354 /. 
Blackfriars  Theatre,  300,  note;  380, 

382. 
"Blind  Beggar  of  Alexandria,  The" 

(G.  Chapman),  402 /.,  416. 
"Blind  Beggar  of  Bednal-Green,  The" 

(Chettle  and  Day),  342,  361. 
"Blurt  Master  Constable"  (T.  Mid- 

dleton),  417. 

Boas,  F.  S.,  158,  note;  384,  note. 
Bobadill,  151. 

Boccaccio,  G.,  135,  166,  257,  260. 
Bolingbroke,  L.  T.,  7,  note;  41. 
Bond,  R.  W.,  173,  184,  185. 
Borne,  William  (or  Birde),  354. 
Boy  Bishop,  The,  4. 
Bradley,  Henry,  105,  note;  142,  162, 

note;  183. 

Brandon,  Samuel.   See  "Octavia." 
Brereton,  J.  LeG.,  S64,  296. 
"Broken  Heart,  The"  (J.  Ford),  445. 
Brome;  play  of  "Abraham's  Sacrifice," 

preserved  at,  21-23,  45. 
Brooke,  Lord.   See  Greville. 
Brooke,  C.  F.  T.,  95,  note;  177,  note; 

253,  254,  431,  note. 
"Buckingham"  (lost  play),  322. 
"Bugbears,  The,"  168  /.,  184,  403, 

note. 

Bullen,  A.  H.,  184,  242,  254. 
Burbage,  James  (the  elder),  428. 
Burbage,  Richard  (the  younger),  58, 

300,  429. 

Burghley  (or  Burleigh),  Lord,  171,176. 
"Burial  and  Resurrection,"  plays  of, 

20,  21,  45. 


Bussy  d'Ambois,  two  parts  (G.  Chap- 
man), 220,  £29,  250. 

Cady,  F.  W.,  6,  note;  44. 

"Caesar,  Julius"  (Sir  William  Alexan- 
der), 201,  202,  ££8. 

"Caesar,  Julius"  (Shakespeare),  202, 
313,  332,  336-338,  349,  375,  note; 
382,  396. 

"  Caesar  and  Pompey  "  (G.  Chapman). 
See  "Pompey  and  Caesar." 

"Calisto  and  Melibea,"  133 /.,  146. 

"Cambises,  King  of  Persia"  (T. 
Preston),  58,  138,  139,  140,  146, 
205,  206,  207,  239. 

"Campaspe"  (J.  Lyly),  173  /.,  178, 
186  f.,  279. 

Campion,  Thomas,  436. 

"Candlemas  Day"  (Digby  play  so 
called),  23-25,  46.  See  also  "Dig- 
by." 

"Captives,  The"  (T.  Hey  wood),  184. 

"Captivi"  (Plautus),  164,  403,  note; 
404. 

"Case  is  Altered,  The"  (B.  Jonson), 
373,  374,  380,  403,  404,  417. 

"Castle  of  Perseverance,  The,"  17, 
50,  51-61,  65,  67,  76,  78,  89,  90, 
110,  119,  136 /. 

"Catiline  his  Conspiracy"  (B.  Jon- 
son),  £26,  349. 

"Celestina,"  133,  146. 

"Chabot,  Tragedy  of "  (Chapman 
and  Shirley),  345,  note. 

Chambers,  E.  K.,  8,  note;  38,  49,  147, 
note;  426,  note  2. 

Chapman,  George,  187,  220,  228,  394, 
399,  402,  404-406,  416. 

Charlemagne.  See  "Distracted  Em- 
peror." 

Chaucer,  Geoffrey,  2,  24,  36,  37,  50, 
79;  connection  between,  and  John 
Heywood.  93;  95,  96,  97;  108,  123, 
166,  290,  409. 

Chester,  plays  performed  at,  8,  15; 
relationship  with  Brome  play  of 
"  Abraham's  Sacrifice,"  22;  35,  36, 
43;  lost  play  of  King  Robert  of 
Sicily  played  at,  46. 

Chettle,  Henry,  212,  220,  228,  275, 
301,  note;  353,  362,  374,  note;  408. 

"Chinon  of  England"  (lost  play),  322. 

Christmas,  dramatic  services  at,  3. 

"Christ's  Burial  and  Resurrection." 
See  "Burial." 

Churchyard,  Thomas.  179,  180,  187. 

Cinthio,  G.,  257.  268. 


INDEX 


451 


"Cleopatra"   (8.   Daniel).  200.  202. 

226  f. 

" Club  Law."  412  /..  4*0. 

"Clyomon  and  Clamides,"  239 /,  863. 

"Cobbler's  Prophecy.  The"  (R.  Wil- 
son), 140,  145. 

Collier,  J.  P.,  38  /..  121,  note;  130, 
note;  219,  353,  note;  371,  note. 

Collins,  J.  Churton.  271. 

"Comedy  of  Errors.  The"  (Shake- 
speare), 140,  152,  153,  159. 

"Comedy  of  Humors,  The"  (Q. 
Chapman),  405. 

"Common  Conditions,"  287 /.,  £63. 

"Concordia  Regularis,"  3,  48- 

Condell,  Henry,  386. 

"Conflict  of  Conscience"  (N.Woodes), 
52,  note;  120-122,  129,  143. 

Congreve,  William,  282. 

"Contention  between  Liberality  and 
Prodigality."  120.  122 /.,  143. 

"Coriolanus"  (Shakespeare),  330, 
337.  348.  396. 

"Cornelia"    (T.   Kyd),    198.    199  /.. 

226,  240. 

Cornish    plays:    mystery    plays,    17, 

4£f.,  54.  57;  "Life  of  St.  Meriasek," 

31,  note;  48. 

Corpus  Christ!,  establishment  of  fes- 
tival. 6.  29,  85. 
Coventry,  plays  acted  at,  7, 8, 9, 12, 15, 

43.   See  also  "  Ludus  Coventrise." 
Cox,  Captain,  of  Coventry,  234. 
"Cox  of  Collumpton"  (lost  play  by 

Day  and  Haughton),  353. 
Crawford,  Charles,  356,  note. 
Creed  plays,  48  /. 
Creizenach,   W.,   38,   80,   note;   206, 

note. 
"Croesus"  (Sir   William  Alexander), 

201,  228. 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  445. 
"Cromwell,     Thomas    Lord,"     299, 

note;  321,  347  f. 
Cromwell,  Thomas,  35. 
Croxton  play.   See  "Sacrament,  Play 

of." 
Cunliffe,  J.  W.,  144,  181  /-.  184,  194, 

note;  195,  222,  224  /• 
"Cursor  Mundi,"  2. 
Curtain  Theatre,  427,  428. 
"Cymbeline"     (Shakespeare),     191, 

note;  279,  282,  285,  339,  350. 
"Cynthia's    Revels"     (B.     Jonson), 

372.  374,  375 /.,  377.  378,  note;  380, 

382,411,414,4/8. 
Cyrua.   See  "  Wars  of  Cyrus." 


"Damon  and  Pithias"  (R.  Edwards), 

58,  138,  146,  188,  205,  206,  239. 
Dance,  village,  4,  230;  morris,  4;  dance 

of  death,  61. 

Daniel,  P.  A.,  367. 

Daniel,  Samuel.  200,  201,  202,  226  /., 
290 /.,  374.  437. 

"Daphnis  and  Cbloe"  (Longus),  259, 
260,  261. 

"Darius"  (Sir  William  Alexander), 
201. 

"Darius."   See  " King  Darius." 

"David  and  Bethsabe"  (G.  Peele). 
142. 

Day,  Angel,  260. 

Day,  John,  288,  353.  354.  362. 

"  Death  of  Robert.  Earl  of  Hunting- 
ton"  (Munday  and  Chettle),  273- 
276,  S94,  341. 

"Debate  of  the  Body  and  Soul," 
50. 

Dekker,  Thomas,  301,  note;  340,  353, 
354,  372,  373,  374,  376,  377,  378, 
384,  388,  408,  410,  415,  417. 

Dennis,  John,  401. 

"Devil  is  an  Ass,  The"  (B.  Jonson), 
419. 

"Devil's  Charter,  The"  (B.  Barnes), 
212,  220,  228. 

"Diana  Enamorada"  (J.  de  Monte- 
mayor),  260 /.,  262. 

"Dido,  Queen  of  Carthago"  (Mar- 
lowe and  Nash),  161,  243,  322. 
note;  348. 

Digby:  plays  in  Digby  MS.  (Bod- 
leian), 23  ff.,  39.  (See  also  "  Can- 
dlemas Day,"  "Mary  Magda- 
lene, Conversion  of,"  and  "Saint 
Paul.") 

"Disobedient  Child,  The"  (T.  Inge- 
leod).  114.  124.  125-127,  135,  136. 
144,  166. 

"Distracted  Emperor,  The"  (or 
"Charlemagne"),  242,  264. 

"Doctor  Faustus"  (Marlowe),  52,  58, 

59,  142,  249  /.,  252,  254,  265,  267. 
.323. 

Dodsfey,  Robert,  "Collection  of  Old 

Plays"  originally  published  by,  25, 

39. 

Dolce,  Lodovico,  190,  196. 
Donne,  John,  280,  444. 
Dowden,  Edward,  282,  note;  443  /. 
"Downfall  of  Robert.  Earl  of   Hun- 

tington.  The"  (A.  Munday),  273  /.. 

275.  294,  341. 
Drayton,  Michael,  353. 


452 


INDEX 


Drummond,  William,  of  Hawthorn- 
den,  378. 

Dublin;  play  of  "  Abraham's  Sacri- 
fice "  preserved  at,  21-23,  46  f. 

Dumb-show,  origin  of  the,  193  /. 

Dunbar,  William,  91. 

"Dux  Moraud,"  27-29,  46,  51. 

Dyce,  A.,  410. 

"Earl  Godwin"  (lost  plays),  301. 

Easter  plays,  2,  /. 

"Eastward  Hoe"  (Chapman,  Jonson, 
and  Marston),  355,  note;  402,  405, 
406,  note;  415,  4/7,442. 

"Edward  I"  (G.  Peele),  266,  338  /., 
349. 

"Edward  II"  (Marlowe),  212,  250 /., 
298,  313,  322 /.,  324,  325,  326,  327, 
329,  348. 

"Edward  III."  331 /.,  349. 

"Edward  IV,"  two  parts  (T.  Hey- 
wood),  343 /.,  350. 

Edwards,  Richard,  150,  431,  note. 

"Elidure."  See  "Nobody  and  Some- 
body." 

Elizabeth,  Queen:  state  of  the  drama 
at  her  death,  1;  her  relations  with 
the  Due  d'Alencon  and  Leicester 
allegorized,  175  ff.;  "Ferrex  and 
Porrex"  presented  before,  191  /.; 
attitude  of  her  government  toward 
common  players,  425  /. 

Elizabethan  drama;  connection  with 
earlier  drama,  37;  contrasted  with 
the  drama  which  followed,  279  /., 
390  /.,  438  ff. 

"Endimion"  (J.  Lyly),  174,  17&-178, 
186. 

"England's  Helicon,"  261. 

"Epicosne"  (B.  Jonson),  404,  419.' 

Eton  School,  158. 

"Euphues"  (J.  Lyly),  171,  175,  178, 
264,  note.  Euphuistic  style  imi- 
tated by  Greene,  246. 

Euripides,  190,  223. 

"Everyman,"  1,  53,  60,  61,  66,  67  f., 
78,  119. 

"Every  Man  in  his  Humor"  (B.  Jon- 
son), 152,  374,  390.  404,  405,  406 /., 
412,  414,  416  f.,  418. 

"Every  Man  out  of  his  Humor"  (B. 
Jonson),  374,  375,  376,  377,  379, 
380,  409 /.,  414.  418. 

"Every  Woman  in  her  Humor,"  417. 

"Fair  Em."  241,  270-272,  276,  293  f., 
338. 


"Faerie    Queene,    The "    (Spenser), 

115,  note;  262,  280. 
"Faithful     Shepherdess,     The"     (J. 

Fletcher),  263,  292,  296. 
Falstaff,  151,  397 /. 
"Family  of  Love,  The"  (T.  Middle- 
ton),  415,  419. 
"  Famous  Victories  of  Henry  V,  The." 

See  "Henry  V." 
"Farewell  to  Folly"  (R.  Greene),  270, 

note. 

"Faustus."   See  "Doctor  Faustus." 
Feast  of  the  Ass,  The,  4. 
"Fedele   and   Fortunio,"    169,     184. 

(Also  called  "Two  Italian  Gentle- 
men.") 
"Ferrex  and  Porrex"  (Sackville  and 

Norton),  139,  190,   191-194,    196. 

205,  208,  209,  223  f.,  302,  369,  423. 

(Also  called  "Gorboduc.") 
Fitch,  R.,  9,  note. 
Fleay,  F.  G.,  369,  note;  372,  374,  376, 

note;  379,  note. 
Fletcher,  John,  406,  443. 
Ford,  John,  445,  446. 
Fortune  Theatre,  300,  note;  381,  430 /. 
"Fountain  of  Self-Love,  The"   (B. 

Jonson).   See  "Cynthia's  Revels." 
"Four  Elements,  Nature  of  the"  (J. 

Rastell),  73-76,  82,  99. 
"Four  P's,  The"  (J.  Heywood),  97. 

102. 
"  Four  Plays  in  One."  See  "Yorkshire 

Tragedy." 
"Four    Prentices   of   London,    The" 

(T.  Heywood),  241 /.,  263,  344. 
Fraunce,  Abraham,  289,  295. 
"Friar  Bacon  and  Friar  Bungay"  (R. 

Greene),    142,  263,  26S-268,    271, 

272,  273,  276,  279,  293. 
Froissart,  translated  by  Lord  Berners, 

299. 
Fulwell,  Ulpian.    See  "Like  Will  to 

Like." 
"Funeral  of  Richard  Coeur  de  Lion, 

The"  (lost  play),  275,  301. 

"Gallathea"  (J.  Lyly),  174,  179,  186, 

290. 
"Gammer    Gurton's     Needle"     (W. 

Stevenson?),     158,    161-164,     166, 

167,  183,  189.  369,  404,  423. 
Gamier,  Robert,  198 /.,  200,  290.       \ 
Gascoigne,  George,  127, 144,  172,  179, 

184,  187,  190,  196,  201,  2S4  f. 
Gayley,  C.  M.,  40,  41,  182. 
Gentillet,  Innocent,  213. 


INDEX 


453 


"Gentleman  and  Husbandman,  Dia- 
logue between  the,"  85. 

"Gentleman  Usher,  The"  (G.  Chap- 
man), 416. 

"Gentleness  and  Nobility"  (J.  Hey- 
wood?).  M/..  102. 

Geoffrey,  Abbot  of  St.  Albana,  26. 

Geoffrey  of  Monmouth,  191  /. 

"George  a  Greene,"  241,  S9S,  297, 
338,  342. 

"Gesta  Romanorum,"  2. 

"Gismond  of  Salerne"  (R.  Wilmot, 
etc.),  196 /..  205,  eSS,  423. 

Glapthorne,  Henry,  446. 

"Glass  of  Government,  The"  (G. 
Gascoigne),  127-189,  144,  166. 

Globe  Theatre,  380,  381,  382.  415, 
429. 

"Godfrey  of  Boulogne"  (lost  play), 
322. 

"Godly  Queen  Hester,"  131 /.,  144. 

"God's  Promises"  (J.  Bale),  86  /., 
100. 

"Golden  Legend,  The"  (J.  de  Vora- 
gine),  2. 

Golding,  Arthur,  133,  144. 

Goldsmith.  Oliver.  282. 

"Goosecap,  Sir  Giles"  (G.  Chap- 
man?), 406,  note;  460. 

"Gorbodue."  See  "Ferrex  and  Por- 
rex." 

Gosson,  Stephen.  233,  234,  435,  440. 

Gower,  John,  2. 

Gray's  Inn,  194,  196. 

Grazzini,  A.  F.,  168. 

Greene,  Robert,  181.  246 /.,  256,  257. 
262.  283-270.  272.  278.  279,  £93, 
311,316.  note;  371. 

Greg,  W.  W.,  270.  note;  288,  note; 
29S. 

Greville,  Fulke  (Lord  Brooke),  201. 
SSO. 

Griseldis,  166.  408.  409. 

"Grissell,  Comedy  of  Meek  and  Pa- 
tient" (John  Phillip),  135,  745,  205, 
206. 

"GriHsell,  Patient"  (Dckker,  Chettle, 
and  !  laugh  ton).  See  "Patient 
Grissell." 

"Groatsworth  of  Wit"  (R.  Greene), 
207.  316,  note. 

Guarini,  Battista,  288. 

Guilds:  rise  of  trade,  6  ff.;  innovations 
in  acting  due  to  guild  performance,  ! 
U/.,-  maintenance  of  guild  plays,  11;  \ 
connection  of  guild  plays  with  later  i 
drama,  13  /. 


Hall,  or  Halle,  Edward,  299. 

"Hamlet"  (Shakespeare),  1,  36,  209, 
212.  220.  244.  2.50,  286,  327.  338, 
381-386,  388 /.,  392. 

"Hamlet,"  the  early  play  (by  T. 
Kyd?),  217,  221,  SS7,  261. 

Hampden,  John,  445. 

"Hardicanute"  (lost  play),  322. 

Harrod,  H.,  9,  note. 

"Harrowing  of  Hell,  The,"  5,  4f. 

Hathway,  R.,  353,  354. 

Haughton,  W.,  353,  362,  374.  note; 
408. 

Hazlitt,  William,  258. 

Hazlitt,  W.  C.,  38,  30,  74,  note. 

Hegge  plays.  S««  "Ludua  Coven- 
trite." 

Heliodorus.   See  "  jEthiopica." 

Hemings,  John,  386. 

Hemingway,  8.  B.,  8,  note;  15,  note; 
40. 

"Henry  I,  Wars  of"  (lost  play),  301. 

"Henry  IV,"  Part  I  (Shakespeare), 
297,  307,  308,  332.  333-336.  349, 
392. 

"Henry  IV,"  Part  II  (Shakespeare), 
297.  307,  308,  312,  note:  332,  333- 
336.  340,  401. 

"Henry  V,  Famous  Victories  of," 
304,  306-306,  346. 

"Henry  V"  (Shakespeare),  250,  297, 
307,  332,  333,  335  /.,  340,  382,  401. 

"  Henry  VI,"  Part  I  (revised  byShake- 
speare),  304.  313-315,  346. 

"Henry  VI,"  Part  II  (Marlowe  and 
Shakespeare),  218.  315-321,  324, 
329.  34  7. 

"Henry  VI,"  Part  III  (Marlowe  and 
Shakespeare),  218,  308,  315-321. 
324,  326,  344,  347. 

Henry  VII:  state  of  drama  at  his  ac- 
cession, 1 ;  the  morality  at  his  acces- 
sion, 66;  development  of  the  inter- 
lude in  his  reign,  71;  allusion  to  his 
death  in  "  Nature  of  the  Four  Ele- 
ments," 74. 

"Henry  VIII"  (Shakespeare  and 
Fletcher),  345  and  note. 

Henslowe.  Philip,  14,  219,  240,  241, 
270,  note;  273.  275.  300,  301.  303, 
321,  322,  353,  354,  362.  381,  404, 
405,  429,  430,  434. 

Herbert,  George,  444. 

Herford.  C.  H.,  38,  130.  note:  144. 

"Hester."  See  "Godly  Queen  Hes- 
ter." 

Heuacr,  W.,  27,  note;  40.  70,  note. 


454 


INDEX 


Heywood,   John,   85,   98-07,    101  }., 

110,  111,  123,  134,  148,  161,  172. 
Heywood,   Thomas,   184,   299,   note; 

343-345,  364,  note;  367,  368,  388, 

414. 

"Hickscorner,"  80/.,  99. 
Higden,     Ranulph:    his    conjectural 

authorship  of   the  Chester  myste- 

ries, 8,  36. 
Hilarius,  27. 
"Histriomastix"  (revised  by  John 

Marston?),  378  /.,  380,  388. 
"Hoffman"   (H.  Chettle),  212,  220, 

275. 
Holinshed,   Raphael,    155,   299,  302, 

307,  330,  331,  353,  357. 
Horace,  192,  195,  203,  204. 
"Horestes"    (J.    Pikering),    59,    138, 

139  /.,  145,  173,  174,205. 
"How  a  Man  May  Choose  a  Good 

Wife  from  a  Bad,"  413  /.,  420. 
Hroswitha  of  Gandersheim,  154. 
Hughes,  Thomas,  194,  195,  201,  20'J. 
"Humorous    Day's  Mirth,     A"    (G. 

Chapman),  405,  416. 
Hunt,  Leigh,  289  /. 
"Huntington,  Robert,  Earl  of."  See 

"Downfall"  and  "Death." 
"Huon  of  Bordeaux"  translated  by 

Lord  Berners,  233;  lost  play,  322. 
Hutton,  Luke,  354  /. 
Hyginus,  173. 
"Hymen's    Triumph"    (S.    Daniel), 


"If  You  Know  Not  Me,  You  Know 

Nobody,"  two  parts  (T.  Heywood), 

299,  note;  344  /.,  350  f.,  392,  note. 
"Impatient  Poverty,"  109,  124,  note 

3;  142. 

"  Ingannati,"  168. 
Ingelend,  Thomas.    See    "Disobedi- 

ent Child." 

Inner  Temple,  The,  196. 
Inn-yard,   performance   of  plays  in, 

64,  424,  428. 
Interlude:  distinguished  from  moral- 

ity, 69  /.,  requisites  of,  70;  aristo- 

cratic character,  71. 
"Iphigenia    at    Aulis  "    (Euripides), 

translated  by  Lady  Lumley,  190, 

jftSS 
"Isle  of  Gulls,  The"  (J.  Day),  288. 

"Jack    Drum's    Entertainment"    (J. 

Marston?),  379  /.,  388. 
"Jack  Juggler,"  156-158,  183. 


"Jack  Straw,   Life  and   Death  of," 

304,  346. 

"Jacob  and  Esau,"  133,  144. 
"James  IV"    (R.  Greene),  263,  266, 

268-270,    273,  293,  297,  338,  339, 

342. 

"Jeronimo,  First  Part  of,"  215,  287  f. 
"Jew  of  Malta"  (Marlowe),  209,  212, 

219,  228,  250  f.,  311,  313. 
"Jocasta"  (translated  by  Gascoigne 

and  Kinwelmersh),  190,  196,  223, 

224  /.,  423. 
"John  a  Kent  and  John  a  Cumber" 

(A.  Munday),  272 /.,  294,  353,  note. 
"John  Baptist"  (J.  Bale),  87,  100. 
"John  Bon,"  85,  101. 
"John  John  the  Husband,  Tib  the 

Wife,  etc."  (J.  Heywood),  97,  102. 
"John,  King  of  England"  (J.  Bale), 

88,  89,  101,  130 /.,  144,  302. 
"John,    King   of    England,  Trouble- 
some Reign  of,"  two  parts,  302  /., 

304,  305,  306,  308,  331,  341,  346. 

(For  Shakespeare's  play,  see  "  King 

John.") 
"John  the  Evangelist,"  104-106,  133, 

142. 

Jones,  Inigo,  432. 
Jonson,  Ben.,  53,  150,  171,  184,  202, 

203,  211,  233,  note;  245,  280,  292, 

353  /.,  372,  373-378,  379,  380,  381, 

384,   385,  386,  388,  390,  394,  39£; 

his   comedies   discussed,   402-408; 

409  /..  410,  411,  415,  418  f.,  437, 

442. 

"Julius  Csesar."   See  "Caesar." 
Jusserand,  J.  J.,  41,  124,  note. 

Kemp,  William,  384. 

King  Arthur,  137. 

"King  Darius,"  131,  132 /.,  139,  140, 
144,  148,  205,  440. 

"  King  John"  (Shakespeare),  304-306, 
331,  341,  346.  (For  other  plays  on 
this  subject,  see  "  John,  King  of  Eng- 
land.") 

"King  Lear"  (Shakespeare),  191, 
note;  192,  286.  339,  350,  39S-400. 

"King  Leir  and  his  Three  Daughters," 
339,  350. 

Kinwelmersh,  Francis,  190,  196,  224  f. 

Kirchmayer,  Thomas  (Naogeorgius), 
130. 

Kirkman,  Francis,  219. 

Kittredge,  G.  L.,  165,  184. 

"Knack  to  Know  a  Knave,  A,"  141, 
146,  339. 


INDEX 


455 


"Knight  of  the  Burning  Pestle,  The" 
(Beaumont  and  Fletcher),  242, 
XB4. 

Kyd,  Thomas,   111.   197.   198,   2W- 

m,  see/..  235.  240,  251.  269. 356. 

363,  440. 

"  Lady  of  May,  The"  (Sir  P.  Sidney), 
180,  187. 

Lamb.  Charles,  340,  343. 

Langland,  William,  92,  106.  See 
"Piers  the  Plowman." 

"Lamm  for  London,  A"  (or  "The 
Siege  of  Antwerp"),  343,  351. 

Lateware,  D.,  201. 

Lear  (Leir).  See  "King  Lear  (Leir)." 

Leicester,  Earl  of,  represented  in 
"Endimion,"  176  /.;  interest  in 
actors,  426  /. 

"Liberality  and  Prodigality."  See 
"Contention  between  Liberality 
and  Prodigality." 

Lewis,  C.  M.,  SS7. 

"  Like  Will  to  Like,  etc."  (Ulpian  Ful- 
well).  108  /.,  136,  148. 

Lincoln:  mystery  plays  at,  7,  8;  mira- 
cle play,  46;  paternoster  play,  49. 

Lindsay,  Sir  David,  88  ff.,  100. 

Liturgical  pi  aye,  5,  6. 

"Locrine,"  191,  note;  267-269,  Ztfi, 
302,  310.  311.  331. 

Lodge,  Thomas,  247.  256,  257,  262, 
312. 

London  corporation,  hostility  to 
plays,  426. 

"London  Prodigal,  The,"  79.  414. 
4011. 

"Longer  Thou  Livest,  the  More  Fool 
Thou  Art"  (W.  Wager),  111.  119  f., 
143. 

Longus.   See  "  Daphnis  and  Chloe." 

"Look  About  You,"  341.  360. 

"  Looking  Glass  for  London  and  Eng- 
land. A  "  (Lodge  and  Greene),  142, 
246  f..tSS. 

"Lord  Governance  and  Lady  Public- 
Weal"  (lost  play  by  John  Roo),  83, 
100. 

Lord  of  Misrule,  4,  194. 

"Love,  Play  of"  (J.  Heywood),  95. 
96,  101. 

"Love  and  Fortune,  The  Rare  Tri- 
umphs of."  140, 186  /..  187. 

"Love's  Labor's  Lost  "(Shakespeare), 
178,  395. 

"Love's  Labor  Won"  (unidentified 
play  by  Shakespeare),  395,  note. 


"Love's  Metamorphosis"  (J.  Lyly), 

174,  179,  186. 

Lucrece:  fragmentary  interlude  deal- 
ing with  Publius  Cornelius   and  a 

lady  Lucrece,  134. 
"Ludus  Coventri®"  (so  called),  17- 

20.  35,  45,  57,  61.  89. 
"Ludus  de  Sancta   Katarina"    (lost 

play),  26. 

Lumley,  Lady,  190,  StS. 
Lupton,  T.   See  "All  for  Money." 
"  Lust's  Dominion,"  212,  219,  S28. 
"Lusty  Juventus"  (R.  Wever).  81 /., 

99. 
Luther,  Martin,  satirized  in  lost  Latin 

play,  83  /. 
Lyly.  John.  111.  153,  16»-17»,  185. 

264,  note;  265.  267,  369,  371,  391, 

note;  413.  423,  432. 

"Macbeth"  (Shakespeare),  214,  note; 

286,  329,  330.  336.  348,  360.  366, 

392,  399. 
MacCracken,  H.  N.,  79,  note;  108, 

note. 

Machiavelli.  N.,  213  /. 
Macro  plays,  51,  61,  63.  64,  66.  67. 

See  alto  "Castle  of  Perseverance," 

"Mind,  Will,  and  Understanding," 

and  "Mankind." 

Macropedius.  Georgius.  124,  125.  128. 
"Mad  World.  My  Masters.  A"  (T. 

Middleton).  415.  419. 
"Magnetic  Lady,  The"  (B.  Joneon). 

419. 
"Magnificence"     (J.     Skelton),     60. 

note;  82 /.,  91,  100,  106.  116.  note: 

131.  132.  439. 

"Maid's  Metamorphosis,  The,"  187. 
Malory,  Sir  Thomas,  37,  232. 
"  Mankind."  83-46.  67,  78.  423,  424. 
Manly,  J.  M.,  40,  192.  231,  note. 
Mantuanus      (Battista      Spagnuoli). 

258.  259. 
Marlowe.  Christopher.  111.  193,  197. 

212,  217.  222,  SS8,  235,  239  /.,  241. 

243-244,  154,  278,  298,  301.  302. 

304.  312.  316-323.  324.  325,  327. 

329,  345,  348,  371,  440. 
Marot.  Clement,  180,  259. 
Marprelate.  See  "Martin  Marpre- 

late." 
"  Marriage  of  Wit  and  Science,"  76/.. 

99.   (See  also  John  Redford's  "  Wit 

and  Science.") 
"Marriage  of  Wit  and  Wisdom"  (F. 

Merbury),  77  /.,  99. 


456 


INDEX 


Marston,  John,  220,  228,  374,  376, 

note;  376,  note;  378-380,  381,  S88, 

410,  442. 

Martin  Marprelate,  370 /.,  372. 
"Mary  Magdalene,   Conversion  of" 

(Digby  MS.),  33-35,  J,6,  64,  110. 
"Mary  Magdalene,  Life  and  Repent- 
ance of"  (W.  Wager),  111,  118  /., 

143. 
"Massacre  at  Paris"  (Marlowe),  298, 

304,  311,  312 /.,  318,  343,  345. 
Massinger,  Philip,  443. 
Matthew  Paris,  26. 
"May  Day"  (G.  Chapman),  404,  416. 
"Mayor  of  Queenborough,  The"  (T. 

Middleton),  339,  860. 
"Measure     for     Measure"     (Shake- 
speare), 256,  281,  284,  401,  note; 

442. 
Medwall,  Henry,  72,  note;  98.    See 

also  under  "Nature." 
"Menffichmi"    (Plautus),    156,    160, 

182. 
"Menaphon"  (R.  Greene),  262,  263, 

288. 

Merbury,  Francis,  77,  99. 
"Merchant  of  Venice,  The"  (Shake- 
speare),   152,   279,   281,  295,  299, 

note;  392. 

Meres,  Francis,  233,  234,  272,  395. 
"Merry  Devil  of  Edmonton,  The," 

163,  876-879,  294- 
"Merry    Wives   of    Windsor,    The" 

(Shakespeare),  400  /. 
"Michaelmas Term"  (T.  Middleton), 

415,  419. 

"Microcosmos"  (T.  Nabbes),  103. 
"Midas"    (J.  Lyly),   174,    175,   176, 

1S6. 
Middleton,    Thomas,  280,   394,  415, 

419  f.,  443. 
"Midsummer    Night's    Dream,    A" 

(Shakespeare),  152,  178,  180,  186, 

269,  270,  279,  280,  282,  283,  287, 

295. 
"Miles    Gloriosus"    (Plautus),    159, 

161. 

Milton,  John,  444. 
Mimes,  4,  147. 
"Mind,    Will    and     Understanding" 

(or  "Wisdom"),  61-63,  67,  73,  110. 
Miracle  plays,  26,  47. 
"Mirror   for    Magistrates"    (various 

authors),  299,  302. 
"Mirror    of    the    Periods    of    Man's 

Life,"  79. 
"Miseries     of     Enforced     Marriage, 


I  The"  (G.  Wilkins),  364  /.,  366  /., 
368,  383,  note;  S87  f. 

"Misfortunes  of  Arthur,  The"  (T. 
Hughes,  etc.),  194-196,  197,  205, 
208,  £24,  302,  423. 

"Misogonus"  (L.  Johnson?),  163, 
165-167,  168, 184,  403,  note;  404. 

"Monarchic  Tragedies"  (Sir  William 
Alexander),  201,  226. 

"Monsieur  D'Olive"  (G.  Chapman), 
404,  416. 

Montemayor,  Jorge  de,  260,  261,  262, 
263. 

Morality,  or  Moral  Play:  species  anti- 
cipated in  certain  mysteries,  19;  de- 
fined, 47  /.;  earliest  mention,  48  /.; 
source  of  the  type,  49  /.;  relation  to 
interlude,  69;  plebeian  tendencies, 
71. 

"More,  Sir  Thomas,"  70,  321,  322, 
348. 

More,  Sir  Thomas,  155. 

Morton,  Cardinal,  71. 

"Mother  Bombie"  (J.  Lyly),  153, 
170 /.,  172,  186,  413. 

"Mucedorus,"  59,  241,  263,  262. 

"Much  Ado  about  Nothing"  (Shake- 
speare), 169,  281,  395. 

Munday,  Anthony,  169,  233,  272-276, 
294,  301,  note;  353,  357.  373.  374. 

"Mundus  et  Infans."  See  "World 
and  the  Child,  The." 

"Mustapha"  (F.  Greville),  201,  226. 

Mystery:  connection  with  guilds.  6  /.; 
extant  specimens,  7-9;  origin  of  the 
term,  25;  distinguished  from  mo- 
rality, 47/.;  bourgeois  tendencies  of, 
71. 

Nabbes,  Thomas,  103. 

Nash,  or  Nashe,  Thomas,  142,  146, 

315,  370,  371. 
"Nature"  (H.  Medwall),  71-73.  98, 

110,  115. 

"  Nero,  Tragedy  of,"  349. 
Newcastle  plays,  7,  9,  11,  12,  16,  43  /. 
"New  Custom,"  88,  101,  440. 
"New  Inn,  The"  (B.  Jonson),  419. 
Newton,    Thomas,    189,    190,    note; 


"  Nice  Wanton,"  124 /.,  127. 143,  148, 

166. 

"  Nobody  and  Somebody,"  339,  350. 
"  Norfolk  Archaeology  " :  cited,  7,  note; 

9,  note;  10,  note;  12,  note. 
North,  Sir  Thomas,  299. 
Northampton:  possible  connection  of, 


INDEX 


with  the  "Ludus  Coventrise,"  19; 
with  the  "Dublin"  play  of  "  Abra- 
ham's Sacrifice,"  21. 

Northbrook,  John,  427  f.,  435,  440. 

"Northward  Hoe"  (Dekker  and  Web- 
ster), 415.  417. 

Norton.  Thomas.  191,  193,  194.  195. 
209. 

Norwich  plays,  7,  9, 11, 12.  19,  44- 

"Octavia,   Virtuous"    (S.   Brandon), 

200,  eae. 

CEdipus,  192. 

"Oldcastle,  Sir  John,  First  Part  of" 

(M.  Drayton,  etc.).  163,  301,  321, 

322,  S47. 
"Old  Fortunatus"  (T.  Dekker),  277, 

360. 
"Old  Wives'  Tale.  The"  (G.  Peele), 

242,  664,  279. 
"Orlando  Furioeo"  (R.  Greene),  247, 

•f*. 
"Orphans'  Tragedy"  (lost  play  by  H. 

Chettle),  362. 
'-•Othello"    (Shakespeare),   252.   256, 

261,  286,  324.  360,  399. 
Ovid:  influence  on  Lyly,  173;  180. 
"Owen  Tudor"  (lost  play),  322. 
"Owl    and    the    Nightingale,    The," 

50. 

"Page  of  Plymouth"   (lost  play  by 

Jonson  and  Dekker).  353,  3*4. 
Pageant,  10,  11;  Rogers's  description 

of.  12  /. 
"Palace  of  Pleasure"   (W.  Painter). 

235,  256,  257. 
"Palemon  and  Arcite"  (lost  play  by 

R.  Edwards).  431. 

"Pammachius"(T.  Kirchmayer),  130. 
"Pandosto"  (R.  Greene),  256,  263 /. 
"Pardoner  and  the  Friar,   The"    (J. 

Hey  wood),  97,  101. 
Parnassus  plays.   See  "Pilgrimage  to 

Parnassus"     and     "Return    from 

Parnassus." 

Parrott,  T.  M.,  404,  406,  416. 
Pasqualigo,  Luigi,  169. 
"  Pastor  Fido.  II"  (B.  Guarini),  289, 

eos. 

Patericke,  or  Patrick.  Simon.  213. 

Paternoster  plays,  48  /. 

"Patient  Grissell"  (Dekker,  Chnttle, 
and  Haughton).  374,  notc;M8-41«. 
416.  (For  another  play  on  this  sub- 
ject, tee  "Grissell.") 

Pavier,  Thomas,  366. 


Peelc,  George.  180, 187.  236,  265,  266, 

267.  279,  312,  440. 
Pembroke,  Countess  of  (Lady  Mary 

Sidney).   190,    197,    198.   201,  MB, 

290.  437. 
Penniman,  J.  H.,  374.  376.  note;  379, 

note;  387  f. 

"Pericles"  (G.  Wilkins?  and  Shake- 
speare), 279,  282.  S9S,  364. 
"Perkin  Warbeck "   (J.  Ford),  345, 

S49. 

Petrarch,  F..  166. 
Pettie.George, "  Petite  Palace  of  Pettie 

his  Pleasure,"  256. 
Phelps.  W.  L.,  416. 
Philip  II  of  Spain,  satirised  in  Lyly't 

"Midas,"  175. 

Phillip,  John.  See  "Grissell." 
"Philotas"  (S.  Daniel),  200 /.,  gfff. 
"Pierce  of  Exton"  (lost  play),  301. 
Pierce,  F.  E.,  417. 
"Pierce  Penniless"  (T.  Nash),  315. 
"Piers  the  Plowman"  (W.  Langland). 

53.  79,  92. 

Pikering,  John.    See  "  Horestes." 
"Pilgrimage  to  Parnassus,"  411,  480. 
"Pinner    of    Wakefield,    The."     See 

"George  a  Green." 
Planctus  Marite,  in  play  of   "Burial 

and  Resurrection,"  20. 
Plautus:  imitation  of,  148  ff.,  156  ff.; 

influence  of,  on  early  English  com- 

sdy,    150-154,    155;  translation  of. 

156.  182;  170,  172.  188,  402.  403. 

note;  404. 
Pliny.  173. 
Plutarch,  173,  200,  203.  269.  299,  312. 

330,  338. 
"Poetaster,  or  the  Arraignment"  (B. 

Jonson),  372,  373,  374,  376,  note; 

377.  378.  380,  381,  382,  383.  384, 

385.  S88,  407,  417. 
Poliziano,  Agnolo,  289. 
Pollard,  A.  W.,  40,  65,  67. 
"Pompey  and  Caesar,  Wars  of"  (G. 

Chapman),  345,  note. 
Preston,  Thomas,  236.  See  oho  under 

"Cambiaes." 
"Prick     of     Conscience"     (Richard 

Rolle).  2. 

"  Pride  of  Life."  «0/..  54,  61,  67. 
Prodigal  Son  story,  a  theme  for  inter- 
ludes, 124  ff..  144. 
"  Promos  and  Cassandra. "  two  parts, 

(G.  Whetstone),  360,  note. 
Prudentius.  50. 
Publius  Cornelius.   Ste  "Lucreoe." 


458 


INDEX 


"Puritan,  The,"  79,   169,  412,  415, 
421,  433,  note;  442. 

"Queen's  Arcadia,  The"  (S.  Daniel), 
291, 


Rabelais,  213. 

"Ralph  Roister  Doister"  (N.  Udall), 

86, 158-161, 162,  163,  164, 167, 183, 

184,  423. 
Ramsay,  R.  L.,  60,  note;  83,  note; 

100,  116,  note. 
"  Rare  Triumphs  of  Love  and  Fortune, 

The."   See  under  "Love." 
Rastell,  John,  69;  authorship  of  "The 

Nature  of  the  Four  Elements,"  74; 

publisher  of  "Gentleness  and  No- 
bility," 102,  and  "Calisto  and  Meli- 

bea,"  133,  145;  134. 
"Rebelles"  (G.  Macropedius),  124. 
Redford,  John,  76,  77,  99. 
Reed,  E.  B.,  384,  note. 
Religion,  relation  of,  to  dramatic  pro- 
gress, 2,  439  ff. 
"Respublica,"  85/.,  89,  100,  106,  114, 

13],  148,440. 
"Return  from  Parnassus,  The,"  two 

parts,    383-385,      389,    (2d     part 

only);  411  /.,  413,  420. 
Revels  Office,  194. 
"Revenger's     Tragedy,     The"     (C. 

Tourneur),  220,  828,  445. 
"Richard  I."    See  "Funeral  of  Rich- 
ard Coeur  de  Lion." 
"Richard  II"  (Shakespeare),  251  /., 

297,  313,  323,  326-328,  329,  331, 

333,  336,  348,  392. 
"Richard     II."      See     "Woodstock, 

Tragedy  of." 
"Richard   III"    (Shakespeare),    212. 

250,  252,  297,  308,  323-326,  330, 

344,  346,  S48. 
"Richard  III,  True  Tragedy  of,"  304, 

308-310,  311,  $46. 
"Robin  Conscience,"  84,  101. 
Robin  Hood,  137,  230  /.,  238,  252  /., 

273  /.,  292,  341. 
Rogers,   Archdeacon,  his  account  of 

the  Chester  plays,  12  /. 
"Roister      Doister."       See      "Ralph 

Roister  Doister." 
"Romance   of   the   Rose,   The"    (G. 

de   Lorris  and   J.   de   Meung),   50, 

51. 
"Romeo  and  Juliet"  (Shakespeare), 

161,  221 /.,  335,  414. 
Roo,  John,  83,  100. 


"Rosalinde"  (T.  Lodge),  256,  262. 
Rose  Theatre,  300,  note;  429. 
Rowe,  Nicholas,  249,  401. 
Roxburghe  Ballads,  354  /. 

Sackville,  Thomas,  Earl  of  Dorset, 
150,  191,  192,  193,  194,  195,  201. 
See  "Ferrex  and  Porrex." 

Sacrament,  Play  of  the,  29-31,  46. 

"Sad  Shepherd,  The"  (B.  Jonaon), 
263,  292,  296. 

St.  George  plays,  4,  31,  note;  41- 
St.  Katherine.  See  "Ludus  de  Sancta 
Katarina." 

"St.  Paul,  Conversion  of"  (Dibgy 
MS.),  31-33,  46. 

Sannazzaro,  J.,  260. 

"Sapho  and  Phao"  (J.  Lyly),  174, 
175,  176,  178,  186. 

"Satiromastix"  (T.  Dekker).  312, 
note;  340,  372,  373,  376,  note;  378, 
note;  379,  380,  383,  384,  388,  410. 

Schelling,  F.  E.,  39,  122,  note;  184, 
226,  345. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  40,  326. 

"Sejanus"  (B.  Jonson),  1,  203,  888, 
349. 

Selden,  John,  445. 

"Selimus,"  311,  346. 

Seneca,  148,  152,  155;  influence  of, 
upon  English  drama,  188  ff.;  trans- 
lation of,  189  /.;  features  of  the 
style  of,  190  /.;  195,  196,  198,  203, 
204,  205,  208,  210,  217,  221,  888  /., 
235,  324. 

Shakespeare,  William:  36,  58,  104; 
the  vice  and  iniquity  in,  142;  150, 
152,  153,  159,  165,  171,  177,  179, 
180,  181,  202,  203,  211,  212,  215, 
218,  221,  245;  contribution  of,  to 
the  structure  of  tragedy,  250;  252, 
257,  258,  261,  267,  269 /.,  272,  276, 
277,  278;  romantic  comedy  of,  279- 
288;  297,  300,  301,  312;  322;  devel- 
opment of  the  history  play  by,  323- 
328,  329,  330,  332-338;  355,  360, 
363,  364,  366,  380,  382,  383,  384, 
392;  attitude  of,  toward  realism, 
394-401;  410,  411,  415,  429;  allu- 
sions of,  to  Puritanism,  442. 

Sharp,  Thomas,  12,  43. 

"  Shepherd's  Calendar,  The"  (E. 
Spenser),  180,  259,  280. 

Sheridan,  R.  B.,  282. 

Shirley,  James,  280,  443,  446. 

"Shoemaker's  Holiday,  The"  (T. 
Dekker),  277,  338,^343,  350. 


INDEX 


459 


Shore-ditch,  location  of  theatres  in, 

428. 

Shrewsbury  fragments,  6,  f.,  42. 
Sidney,  Lady  Mary.    See  Pembroke, 

Countess  of. 
Sidney,  Sir  Philip,  180.  187,  193.  208, 

256,  257.  261.  262.  430,  435,  437. 
"Siege     of     Antwerp,      The."      See 

"Larum  for  London." 
"Silent  Woman,  The"  (B.  Jonson). 

See  "Epiccene." 
Simpson,    Richard,    357,    note;    369, 

note. 
Skelton,   John,   100,    116,   273.   439. 

See  also  "Magnificence." 
Small.  R.  A..  376.  note;  387. 
Smith,  Wentworth,  353,  354. 
"Soliman  and  Perseda"  (T.  Kyd?), 

MS  /..  en.  240.  246,  363. 
Bomer,  Will.   See  "Summer." 
"  Spanish  Moor's  Tragedy,  The  "  (un- 
identified play  by  Dekker,  Haugh- 

ton,  and  Day),  219.    See  "Lust's 

Dominion." 
"Spanish  Tragedy,  The"  (T.  Kyd), 

197,  200,  209-215,  216,  217,  221, 

**7,  240.  245,  366. 
Spenser,  Edmund,  37,  50.   112,   115, 

207,  note;  259,  436. 
"Spiritata,  La"  (Grauini),  168. 
"Staple  of  News,  The"  (B.  Jonson), 

419. 

Btevenson,  William.  162,  183. 
Stirling,  Earl  of.    See  Alexander,  Sir 

William. 

Stockwood,  John,  sermon  by,  428. 
Stow,  John.  299.  353,  357.  363. 
Strange,  Lord;  the  company  of,  218, 

270,  note;  429  /. 
Stubbea,       Philip,       "Anatomic      of 

Abuses,"  4,  note. 
Stukely,  311.  321,  322,  348. 
Summer,  Will,  93,  167. 
"Summer's    Last    Will    and    Testa- 
ment" (T.  Nash),  142,  146. 
"Supposes,  The"  (G.  Gascoigne),  129, 

153,  164 /.,  168.  184,  423. 
"Suppositi"   (L.  Ariosto),   149,   164, 

168,  172. 

Surrey,  Henry,  Earl  of,  190. 
Swan  Theatre,  300,  note;  sketch  of  in- 
terior, frontispiece. 
Symonds,  J.  A.,  SO,  438. 

"Tale  of  a  Tub,  A"  (B.  Jonson),  MS 

f.,418. 
"Tamar  Com"  (lost  play),  322. 


"  Tamburlainc. "  two  parts  (Marlowe), 

58, 193,  197,  235.  240.  241,  Z43-246. 

249,  250,  252,  264,  265,  280,  298, 

301  /.,  303.  304.  309,  310.  311.  312, 

318.  321,  323,  333. 
"Tamerlane  "  (N.  Rowe),  249. 
"Taming  of  a  Shrew,  The."  184. 
"Taming  of  the  Shrew,  The"  (Shake- 
speare). 149.  167.  185.  281. 
"Tancred  and  Giamunda"  (R.  Wil- 

mot,  etc.).    See  "Gismond  of  Sa- 

lerne." 

Tasso,  Torquato.  259,  288,  289,  290. 
"Tempest,  The"  (Shakespeare),  279. 

284.  285.  286,  287.  288,  295,  399. 
"Temptation  of  our  Lord,  The"  (J. 

Bale),  87,  100. 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  274. 
Terence:  Dutch  imitators  of,  128;  148: 

influence  of,  on  early  English  com- 
edy, 150-154;  translations  of,  156, 

181;  168,  170,  172,  188,  394.  402, 

404. 
Textor,  Ravisius  (Tixier  de  Ravisi). 

126,  135-138. 
Theatre,     The     (the     playhouse    so 

called),  427,  428,  429. 
"Thersites,"  120,  note;  135-138,  139, 

144  f. 

Thomas,  D.  L.,  364,  note. 
Thompson,  E.   N.  S.,  48,  note;  53, 

note;  67,  386. 
Thorndike,  A.  H.,  274,  note;  gee,  £93. 

194. 

"Thracian  Wonder,  The,"  194. 
"Three  Estates,  Satire  of  the"  (Sir 

David  Lindsay).  83,  88-93,  100. 
"Three  Ladies  of  London,  The"  (R. 

W.),  140  /.,  146. 
"Three  Laws,  The"  (J.  Bale),  87,  89, 

91,  101,  112. 
"Three  Lords  and  Three  Ladies  of 

London,  The"  (R.  W.),  141,  146  f. 
"Thyestes"  (Seneca),  195,  208,  tiS. 
"Tide  Tarrieth  No  Man.  The"  (G. 

Wapull).  111.  113-117.  141,  143. 
"Timon"  (anonymous  comedy),  410 

/..  417. 
"Timon    of    Athens"    (partially    by 

Shakespeare),  410. 
"Titus     Andronicus"     (revised     by 

Shakespeare),  209,   212,   217.  818, 

219,  220.  221,  tfS. 
"Tom  Tyler  and  his  Wife,"  97.  note, 

Wt. 

"Tottel's  Miscellany."  112. 
Tournuur.  Cyril,  220,  tiS,  440. 


460 


INDEX 


Towneley  plays.   See  "Wakefield." 
"  Trial  of  Chivalry,  The, "  242/.,  253 /., 

343. 

"Trial  of  Treasure,  The,"  109 /.,  143. 
"Trick  to  Catch  the  Old  One,  A"  (T. 

Middleton),  415,  419- 
"Troilus     and     Cressida"     (Shake- 
speare), 384,  388. 
Trope,  3,  42. 
"  Troublesome  Reign  of  John,  King  of 

England."   See  "John." 
"Twelfth  Night"  (Shakespeare),  256, 

257,  263,  270,  279,  280,  284.  287, 

/.,  £96. 
"Two  Angry  Women  of  Abingdon" 

(H.  Porter),  404,  420. 
"Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona"  (Shake- 
speare),  261,   279,  280,  283,   283, 

287,  295,  401,  note. 
"Two     Italian      Gentlemen."       See 

"Fedele  and  Fortunio." 
"Two  Lamentable  Tragedies."    See 

"Two  Tragedies  in  One." 
"Two  Noble  Kinsmen"  (Fletcher  and 

Shakespeare?),  281. 
"Two  Tragedies  in  One"  (R.  Yaring- 

ton),  355,  362 /.,  365,  387. 

Udall,  Nicholas,  27,  86,  150;  transla- 
tion of  Terence  by,  156,  182;  char- 
acteristics of,  as  a  dramatist,  159  /.; 
175,  183,  393. 

Underdowne,  Thomas,  260. 

"Ur-Hamlet,  The."   See  "Hamlet." 

"Utopia"  (Sir  Thomas  More),  155. 

"Valiant  Welshman,  The"  (R.  A.), 

340,  350. 

Vaughan,  Henry,  444. 
Vaughan,  William,  441. 
Vergil,  180,  258. 
"View  of  Sundry  Examples,  A"  (A. 

Munday),  353,  357 /. 
"Vittoria     Corombona,"     or     "The 

White  Devil"  (J.  Webster),  445. 
"Volpone"  (B.  Jonson),  415,  417. 

Wager,  Lewis.  See  "Mary  Magda- 
lene, Life  and  Repentance  of." 

Wager,  W.,  "Cruel  Debtor,"  143. 
See  also  "  Longer  Thou  Livest,  etc." 

Wakefield  plays,  7,  8,  16  /.,  44,  147. 
Also  called  "Towneley  plays." 

Wallace,  C.  W.,  382,  387. 

Wallace,  M.  W.,  160,  note. 

Wapull,  George.  See  "Tide  Tarrieth 
No  Man."  / 


War  of  the  Theatres,  The,  370,  37»- 
386,  387,  389  /.,  407. 

"Warning  for  Fair  Women,  A,"  354, 
355,  357-362,  363,  368,  387. 

"Wars  of  Cyrus,  The."  247-249,  265. 

"Watkyn  and  Jeffraye,  Brief  Dia- 
logue between  two  Priests'  Ser- 
vants named,"  84. 

"Weakest  Goeth  to  the  Wall,  The," 
243,  note;  295,  403,  note. 

"Wealth  and  Health,"  106-108,  114, 
142. 

"Weather,  Play  of  the"  (J.  Hey- 
wood),  94,  95  /.,  101. 

Webster,  John,  221,  415,  417,  445. 

Westminster  School,  154. 

"Westward  Hoe"  (Dekker  and  Web- 
ster), 415,  417. 

"What  You  Will"  (J.  Mareton), 
388. 

"What  You  Will"  (Shakespeare). 
See  "Twelfth  Night." 

"When  You  See  Me,  You  Know  Me" 
(S.  Rowley),  342,  SSI. 

Whetstone,  George,  360,  note. 

White,  Thomas,  sermon  by,  427. 

"White  Devil,  The"  (J.  Webster). 
See  "  Vittoria  Corombona." 

"Whore  of  Babylon,  The"  (T.  Dek- 
ker), 342  /.,  351. 

"Widow's  Tears,  The"  (G.  Chap- 
man), 416. 

Wilkins,  George,  364,  365,  366,  387  f. 

Williams,  W.  H.,  105,  note;  141. 

Wilmot,  Robert.  See  "Gismond  of 
Salerne." 

Wilson,  Robert  (the  elder),  140, 145  f. 

Wilson,  Robert  (the  younger),  353. 

"Wily  Beguiled,"  154,  413,  414,  421. 

"Winter's  Tale,  The"  (Shakespeare), 
152,  256,  270,  279,  280,  284.  285, 
286,  296. 

"Wisdom."  See  "Mind,  Will,  and 
Understanding." 

"Wit  and  Science"  (J.  Redford),  78, 
82,  99. 

"Witty  and  Witless"  (J.  Heywood), 
93,  94,  102. 

Wolsey,  Cardinal,  satirized  in  inter- 
ludes, 83,  84  /. 

"Woman  in  the  Moon,  The"  (J. 
Lyly),  174,  179,  186. 

"Woman  Killed  with  Kindness,  A" 
(T.  Heywood),  367 /.,  388. 

Woodes,  Nathaniel.  See  "Conflict  of 
Conscience,  The." 

"Woodstock,  Tragedy  of,"  328 /,  349. 


INDEX 


461 


"World  and  the  Child.  The,"  78-80. 

SB. 

Wot  ton,  Henry,  215,  note. 
"Wounds  of  Civil   War,   The"   (T. 

Lodge),  304,  312.  346. 
"Wyat,  Sir  Thomas"   (Dekker   and 

Webster),  344.  SSI. 
Wyclif.  John,  49. 
Wylley,     Thomas,     lost     Protestant 

dramas  by,  84,  101. 
Wynkyn  de  Worde,  78,  80. 

Yarington.  Robert,  355,  362,  363,  365. 

387. 

Yeats,  W.  B..  328,  note. 
Yelverton,  Christopher,  196. 


Yong,  or  Young,  Bartholomew,  261. 

York,  mystery  plays  at,  7,  8,  12,  15, 
44  /•>'  paternoster  and  creed  plays 
at,  49. 

"Yorkshire  Tragedy,  A,"  352,  355, 
383-366,557. 

Young,  K.,  4£,  93,  note;  lOt. 

"Your  Five  Gallants"  (T.  Middle- 
ton),  415,  420. 

"Youth,  Interlude  of,"  80,  note;  81/.. 
90. 

Yver,  Jacques,  215,  note. 

"  Zabeta.  Masque  of"  (G.  Gascoigne), 
179,  187. 


RIVERSIDE  LITERATURE  SERIES 

LIBRARY   BINDING 
All  prices  are  postpaid. 


Sir  Gawain  and  the  Green  Knight,  and  Piers  the  Ploughman. 
WEBSTER  AND  NEILSON.  60  cents. 

Chaucer's  The  Prologue,  The  Knight's  Tale,  and  The  Nun's  Priest's 

Tale.    MATHER.     55  cents. 
Malory's  The  Book  of  Merlin  and  the  Book  of  Sir  Balin.    CHILD. 

40  cents. 
Ralph  Roister  Doister.    CHILD.     55  cents. 

The  Second  Shepherds'  Play,  Everyman,  and  Other  Early  Plays. 
CHILD.  55  cents. 

Spenser's  Faerie  Queene.    Book  I.    SHACKFORD.    55  cents. 

Bacon's  Essays.    NORTHUP.    55  cents. 

Shakespeare  Questions.    SHEPARD.     55  cents. 

Milton's  Of  Education,  Areopagitica,  The  Commonwealth.  LOCK- 
WOOD.  65  cents. 

English  and  Scottish  Ballads.    WITHAM.    55  cents. 

Boswell's  Life  of  Johnson.    JENSEN.    55  cents. 

Goldsmith's  The  Good-Natured  Man,  and  She  Stoops  to  Conquer. 
DICKINSON.  55  cents. 

Sheridan's  The  School  for  Scandal.     WEBSTER.    55  cents. 

Shelley's  Poems.    (Selected.)     CLARKE.    65  cents. 

Carlyle's  Heroes,  Hero-Worship,  and  The  Heroic  in  History. 
ADAMS.  65  cents. 

Selections  from  the  Works  of  John  Ruskin.    TINKER.     65  cents. 
Huxley's  Autobiography,  and  Selected  Essays.    SNELL.     55  cents. 
Selections  from  the  Prose  Works  of  Matthew  Arnold.    JOHNSON. 
65  cents. 

Selected  Literary  Essays  from  James  Russell  Lowell.    HOWE  and 

FOERSTER.     65  cents. 

Howells's  A  Modern  Instance.     75  cents. 
Briggs's  College  Life.    40  cents. 
Briggs's  To  College  Girls.    40  cents. 

Perry's  The  American  Mind  and  American  Idealism.    40  cents. 
Burroughs's  Studies  in  Nature  and  Literature.     40  cents. 
Newman's  University  Subjects.     40  cents. 
Bryce's  Promoting  Good  Citizenship.     40  cents. 
Eliot's  The  Training  for  an  Effective  Life.    40  cents. 
English  and  American  Sonnets.    LOCKWOOD.    40  cents. 
The  Little  Book  of  American  Poets.     RITTENHOUSE.     65  cents. 
The  Little  Book  of  Modern  Verse.    RITTENHOUSE.    55  cents. 
High    Tide.     An   Anthology   of    Contemporary    Poems.     RICHARDS. 

55  cents. 

Othtr  volumes  in  preparation, 

17U5 


fHE  CAMBRIDGE  POETS-  STUDENTS'  EDITION 

£.  B.  Browning's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  $1.65 

Robert  Browning's  Complete  Poetical  and  Dramatic  Works.  2.50 

Burns's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  1.65 

Byron's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  2.50 

Oryden's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  2.50 

English  and  Scottish  Ballads.  2.50 

Holmes's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  1.65 

Keats's  Complete  Poetical  Works  and  Letters,  X.6J 

XMigfellow's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  I.6J* 

Milton's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  I.6«l 

Pope's  Complets  Poetical  Works.  1.65 

Shakespeare's  Complete  Works.  2.50 

Shelley's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  1.65 

Spenser's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  2.50 

Tennyson's  Poetic  and  Dramatic  Works.  3.6s 

Whittier's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  3.65 

Wordsworth's  Complete  Poetical  Works.  2.50 

ANTHOLOGIES:  POETRY  AND  DRAMA 

The  Chief  Middle  English  Poets.  Translated  and  Edited  by 

JESSIE  L.  WESTON.  2.2J 

The  Chief  British  Poets  of  the  Fourteenth  and  Fifteenth  Cen- 
turies. Edited  by  W.  A.  NEILSON  and  K.  G.  T.  WEBSTER.  2.75 

The  Leading  English  Poets  from  Chaucer  to  Browning.  Ed- 
ited by  L.  H.  HOLT.  2.50 

A  Victorian  Anthology.  Edited  by  EDMUND  CLARENCE  STED- 

MAN.  Students'  Edition.  2.25 

rb.e  Chief  American  Poets.     Edited  by  C.  H.  PAGE.  2.00 

An  American  Anthology.  Edited  by  EDMUND  CLARENCE  STED- 

MAN.  Students'  Edition.  2.50 

Little  Book  of  Modern  Verse.  Edited  by  JESSIE  B.  RITTEN- 
HOUSE.  R.L.S.  No.  254.  Library  binding.  .53 

Little  Book  of  American  Poets.  Edited  by  JESSIE  B.  Rrr- 
TENHOUSE.  R.L.S.  No.  255.  Library  binding.  .65 

Sigh  Tide.  Edited  by  Mrs.  WALDO  RICHARDS.  R.L.S.  No.  256. 
Library  binding.  .  _  £& 

A.  Treasury  of  War  Poetry.  Edited  by  GEORGE  H.  CLARKE. 

R.L.S.  No.  262.  Cloth.  .54' 

The  Chief  Elizabethan  Dramatists.  Edited  by  W.  A.  NEILSON.      3.00 

Chief  European  Dramatists.  In  Translation.  Edited  by 

BRANDER  MATTHEWS.  3.00 

Chief  Contemporary  Dramatists.  Edited  by  THOMAS  H. 
DICKINSON.  3.ot 

Prices  are  net,  postpaid. 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

BOSTON        NEW  YORK        CHICAGO 

MM 


FOR  COLLEGE  COURSES  ON 
THE  DRAMA 


DRAMATIC  TECHNIQUE 

By  GEORGE  PIERCE  BAKER,  Professor  of  Dramatic  Literature,  Harvard  Unv 
versity.    £3.00. 

THE  TUDOR  DRAMA 

By  C.  F.  TUCKER  BKOOKI-,  Assistant  Professor  of  English  in  Yale  Univer- 
sity.   81.50. 

An  illuminating  history  of  the  development  of  the  English  drama  during  the 
Tudor  Period,  from  1485  to  the  close  of  thr  reign  of  Elizabeth. 

CHIEF   CONTEMPORARY    DRAMATISTS 

Edited  by  THOMAS  H.  DICKINSON,  Ph.D.,  Associate  Professor  of  English, 

University  of  Wisconsin.     £3.00. 

This  book  presents  within  one  volume  those  plays  apart  from  the  works  of 
Ibsen  which  may  be  considered  landmarks  in  the  field  of  modern  contemporary 
drama.  No  compilation  of  a  like  nature  has  been  previously  made. 

CHIEF   EUROPEAN    DRAMATISTS 

Edited  by  BRANDER  MATTHEWS,  Professor  of  Dramatic  Literature,  Columbia 
University,  Member  of  the  American  Academy  of  Arts  and  Letters.     £3.00. 
This  volume  includes  one  typical  play  from  each  of  the  master  dramatists  of 
Europe,  with  the  exception  of  the  English  writers. 

A  STUDY  OF  THE  DRAMA 

By  BRANDER  MATTHEWS.    Students'  Edition.   $1.50. 

Devoted  mainly  to  an  examination  of  the  structural  framework  which  the  great 
dramatists  of  various  epochs  have  given  to  their  plays ;  it  discusses  only  incident, 
ally  the  psychology,  the  philosophy,  and  the  poetry  of  these  pieces. 

THE  CHIEF  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMATISTS 

Edited  by  W.  A.  NEILSON,  Professor  of  English  Literature  in  Harvard  Uni. 
versity.    $3.00. 

This  volume  presents  typical  examples  of  the  work  of  the  most  important  of 
Shakespeare's  contemporaries,  so  that,  taken  with  Shakespeare's  own  works,  it 
affords  a  view  of  the  development  of  the  English  drama  through  its  most  brilli- 
ant period. 

A  HISTORY  OF  THE  ELIZABETHAN  DRAMA 
By  FELIX  E.  SCHELLING.    Students'  Edition.    2  vols.,  the  set,  $4.00. 
A  history  of  the  drama  in  England,  from  the  accession  of  Queen  Elizabeth  to 

the  closing  of  the  theaters.    By  way  of  introduction,  is  prefixed  a  r6sum6  of  thr 

earlier  drama  from  its  beginnings. 

SHAKESPEARE  QUESTIONS. 

By  ODSLL    SHEPARD.    Riverside  Literature  Series.     No.  146.     Library 

Binding,  .55. 

An  outline  for  the  study  of  the  leading  plays. 


Prices  are  net,  postpaid, 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 
BOSTON          NEW  YORK          CHICAGO 

U2I 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY,  LOS  ANGELES 

COLLEGE  LIBRARY 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


'' 


HAR4    1968 


Aug^o 
E™OT,  TO 


n 

Dec  11  67 


29'* 


Feb768 


Book  Slip — Series  4280 


UCLA-Cottog*  Library 

PR  651  B79 


L  005  665  026  0 


A     001157490 


College 
Library 


PR 

651 

B79 


